“Birds in Ukraine are building nests from drone cable.” The headline itself tells a story, but the subsequent article in The Sunday Times missed the true magnitude of what the story represents.

Almost from the beginning of the Ukraine war more than four years ago, the use of uncrewed drones has drawn significant attention. Observers were overwhelmed with articles declaring that “For Western Weapons, the Ukraine War Is a Beta Test,” or averring that “This drone-on-drone dogfight in Ukraine is a glimpse of the future of war.” The vast majority of such articles attempted to make the case that unmanned drones had fundamentally changed the character of war.

Ukrainian birds have shown that such bold pronouncements are a bit premature. In 2024, Russian troops began deploying small attack drones with cylindrical drums on their bottoms, which contain long spools of fiber-optic cable running back to their operators. The hard-wired connection ensures that the drones cannot be electronically jammed by the enemy.

Read the full article on Responsible Statecraft.

Header image: Ukrainian FPV drone with fiber-optic communication channel. By АрміяІнформ