Russia Gains Upper Hand in Drone Battle

Moscow has gotten better with the war’s deadliest weapons, once Ukraine’s forte

By Ian Lovett, Marcus Walker and Nikita Nikolaienko

KHARKIV, Ukraine—The four Ukrainian soldiers were speeding down a supply road more than 20 miles behind the front line when a Russian drone exploded behind them, throwing the rear of their Nissan Pathfinder into the air.

Capt. Stanislav Derkach was slammed into the dashboard, dislocating his kneecap. He and the three other soldiers hobbled into the woods and watched as a second fixed-wing Molniya drone finished off the SUV.

A few months ago, such rear areas were relatively safe. Now any movement can come under attack. “I consider us very lucky,” said Derkach, who is recovering in a hospital.

Russia’s growing prowess at hitting Ukrainian supply lines with drones is the most important shift in the war in 2025, Ukrainian front-line fighters and analysts studying the conflict say. The tilting tactical balance is also weakening Kyiv’s diplomatic hand.

For most of the nearly fouryear- old war, Ukraine has held a clear advantage in battlefield drones, compensating for Russia’s greater manpower.

But this fall, Russian forces have gained the upper hand in the tactical drone contest for the first time. They are outnumbering Ukraine’s unmanned aerial vehicles in key sections of the front, while us-ing improved tactics.

“Not only are lines of communication wrecked; the very idea of a secure rear is fading,” the former head of Ukraine’s military and currently its ambassador to the U.K., Valeriy Zaluzhniy, warned recently.

Russia is still unable to achieve a breakthrough, Zaluzhniy noted in an analysis of the war for Ukrainian news site Mirror of the Week. Large-scale maneuvering remains nearly impossible, as masses of cheap drones can see and target movement by soldiers or vehicles. But the danger for Ukraine, he said, is that its undermanned army could reach a point of exhaustion unless it can take back the initiative in the drone war.

Moscow changed its drone tactics in 2024, after Ukrainian forces burst into Russia’s Kursk region.

A new unit called Rubicon recruited many of the best Russian drone pilots and targeted Ukrainian logistics in Kursk. They used fiber-optic drones, connected to the pilot by a cable so the signal couldn’t be jammed. Struggling to move supplies, Ukraine’s position crumbled, leading to a bloody retreat.

Rubicon expanded to the eastern front in Ukraine, while training other Russian drone units in its methods.

Ukrainian officers said Rubicon focuses on midrange targets, usually at least 12 miles beyond the front line, bypassing Ukrainian infantry.

Ukrainian logistics and drone units are now suffering greater casualties than the front- line infantry, said Kon--rad Muzyka, director of Polish- based military-analysis firm Rochan Consulting. That is partly because the infantry has so few men, he notes.

Losses are forcing Ukrainian drone pilots to launch from farther back, restricting the range of their attacks. Meanwhile, Russian drones with longer ranges are flying ever deeper into the rear.

“Russian military learning has eclipsed Ukraine’s for midrange strikes,” said George Barros, an analyst at the Institute for the Study of War in Washington. “They are interdicting stuff 40 to 70 kilometers from the front line.”

Ukrainian first-person-view, or FPV, drones still wreak havoc in the last 12 miles or so that Russian troops must traverse to reach the front line. But Ukraine is short of weapons for hitting Russian logistics, command positions and other targets in the rear.

The battle for the city of Pokrovsk in Ukraine’s eastern Donetsk region shows how Russia has gained the lead in tactical drones. Ukrainian troops say Russian drones in the area now outnumber the defenders’ by as many as 10:1.

Much of the city is now a gray zone, with neither side in control and positions scattered throughout the town.

What worries many Ukrainian soldiers most is how Russia’s drones are able to pummel their supply lines into Pokrovsk from as far as 40 miles away. The roads are so dangerous for vehicles that Ukrainian troops are hiking the last 10 miles, said an officer with the 68th Jaeger Brigade, which is defending Pokrovsk.

As well as fiber-optic drones, Russian units are using Lancet fixed-wing drones with a range of up to 25 miles, and growing numbers of the cheaper Molniya models, which can either detonate their own payload or carry two or three small FPVs, ex--tending their range. Some --times the FPVs then attack Ukrainians from their rear.

“When you see a drone flying toward the front, you think it’s one of our drones,” said Yurii Fedorenko, commander of the “Achilles” 429th drone regiment.

Ukraine, which has its own mother-ship drones, is trying to regain the edge. Some Ukrainian officers say their drone forces need to give more priority to hitting Russian drone teams and logistics— mimicking Rubicon’s approach— rather than focusing on Russian infantry.

“Their advantage isn’t in technology but in scale,” said the head of unmanned systems for Ukraine’s 2nd Corps, who goes by the call sign Volt.

Ukraine wants to make more of its own fiber-optic drones. Fedorenko complained that Russia receives huge supplies of fiber-optic cable from China, while Ukraine is getting little from the West.

“Unfortunately, we have to say that China is a stronger ally on this than the U.S. and Europe combined,” he said.

Antidrone nets cover a road in a front-line town in Ukraine. ANATOLII STEPANOV/ REUTERS