KYIV — They’re small, but mighty — and deadly, too.
The Ukrainian Armed Forces’ reliance on cheaper, more compact drones has altered the look of warfare for good, operators and experts tell The Post.
Instead of the hulking craft used by nations like the US — which cost hundreds of millions of dollars — many of Ukraine’s aerial attacks against Russian forces are conducted with simple kamikaze drones worth between $300 and $1,000.
If flown by an experienced pilot, a 6.5-pound drone found in any hobby shop can carry enough explosives to take out an armored vehicle, Andrii Federov, the co-founder and CEO of Ukraine-based Nomad Drones, told The Post on Wednesday.
“If you hit it smartly in the vulnerable parts of a tank, you can even destroy a tank,” Federov said. “So basically, you can cause far more damage for a low cost.”
“I think it changes pretty much everything,” he added of the kamikaze drones. “This is modern warfare.”
Drones are common in armed conflicts. The US has notably used them to conduct airstrikes against terror suspects in places like Iraq, Pakistan, Somalia and Syria.
Since the last American forces left Afghanistan in August 2021, the US has relied heavily on drones to conduct so-called “over the horizon” operations, so named because they are done without putting troops on the ground nearby.
What sets Ukraine’s drone operations apart is the type of craft — typically measuring between eight and 12 inches — that can be used and the frequency with which they can be manufactured.
Nomad alone builds “thousands” of drones per month with a workforce of roughly 60 employees, according to Federov, who declined to give exact production figures, citing operational security.
The Ukrainian reliance on drones was partly born out of necessity. With artillery shells increasingly difficult to source — the American and European defense industries have struggled to keep up production at the rate Kyiv needs — Ukraine improvised and created a drone production industry out of self-sourced material.
One advantage drones have over regular artillery shells is versatility. While kamikaze drones crash into their targets and explode, others can drop bombs and return to their operator. Still others are used for reconnaissance and locating the enemy without sending troops into too-close positions.
Of course, Ukraine isn’t the only combatant using unmanned aircraft. Russia is hammering Ukraine nightly with Iranian-made Shahed drones.
On Saturday night, Moscow sent 267 into Ukrainian airspace, the most since the Kremlin’s full-scale invasion began Feb. 24, 2022.
But while Russia has to go overseas to get its drones, Ukraine is self-reliant on sourcing the systems — and has built up its industry to such an extent that Minister of Digitization Mykhailo Federov told The Post he foresees Ukraine becoming a major exporter of drone technology postwar.
“This will become a really big and new sphere for for our economy, for our budget, for the revenue of Ukraine. And this it really can be like a export oriented here,” said Mykhailo Federov (no relation to Andrii). “Exporting abroad could become the basis for win-win relations with other countries.”
That couldbe good news for the US, which is currently is overly reliant on its top adversary — China — for drones.
“In terms of [the Ukrainian] drones industry, in the last year there have been over 1.5 million drones developed in Ukraine,” the minister said. “We have over 500 manufacturers of drones right now, and in this year we will purchase and deliver even more drones in the last year.”
Still another advantage of drones is that most of their pieces and parts can be made with 3D printers, making resupply logistics on the battlefield dramatically easier, according to Eddie Etue, a US Marine veteran and former Ukraine Foreign Legion fighter.
“It’s a benefit to be able to 3D print so many of the necessary parts because it affords us the opportunity to fabricate this stuff at will, increasing efficiency on the battlefield where you often work with what you’ve got,” Etue told The Post. “You just need a 3D printer, filament, and the STL [design] file.”
Since leaving the Ukrainian frontlines last summer, Etue has studied drone-building in Kyiv, where he has since turned his apartment living room into a volunteer drone workshop — self-funded with his monthly VA pension check — where even simple plastic water bottles can be used to build the containers for what will become bombs on the battlefield.
“All of this is just putting pieces together, you just need a wiring diagram and to know the pieces that are compatible,” said Etue, who can produce one drone a day and has built about 25 in total for shipment to the front.
“But all this is is like paint by numbers with colored wires and molten lead.”