“The Winner is Not the One Who Invented the Technology, But the One Who Scales and Applies It in the Long Run” – Interview with the Commander of the 3rd Assault Brigade’s Strike UGV Company
“The Winner is Not the One Who Invented the Technology, But the One Who Scales and Applies It in the Long Run” – Interview with the Commander of the 3rd Assault Brigade’s Strike UGV Company
Just a moment...
You’re right, in fact, the UGV has long since moved from a general concept to a direction. Earlier, when we talked about UGV, everyone thought about logistics exclusively, but now UGV is like the concept of UAVs. We have UAVs for reconnaissance, we have UAVs for strikes, we have UAVs for long-range strikes, and the issue of unmanned aerial vehicles is already a general area that is divided into types. Now, in the UGV, it all looks the same. UGV is already a direction and it is divided into types. And each type requires its own training and personnel training, depending on what it does. Logistics and evacuation is one thing. If we are talking about the striking direction, it is all different, because all the tasks in the striking UGV are absolutely unique. They are unique in terms of planning, application, and execution. If logistics means established routes, specific positions, steel, and so on, then strike missions are always different. Today we are working to eliminate a hiding place, tomorrow we are working on an ambush in the enemy’s rear to destroy their logistics, the day after tomorrow we are supporting assault operations, and a week later we are helping the infantry to defend their positions. These are all unique missions, unique tasks.
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We have already conducted the first offensive operations. This is not something new for us. Our goal is to scale it up. We want it to become a system involving one, two, or three robots rather than an isolated incident. We have already taken offensive actions using up to five robots acting simultaneously. But we want to bring this to a systemic level.
That is, when battalion commanders plan offensive operations, they should think not about how to accomplish these tasks with infantry, but rather from the perspective of: “We have a company of strike UGVs that can act and carry out offensive operations. Let them plan the actions of the robots that will go first before the infantry. And based on the results of the robots’ work, we will think about how we should proceed with the infantry after them.”
Also see this recent article about UGVs in Defense Express with some good photo examples of the different UGVs Ukraine is using.