[topspin]

"The best way to counter the smaller UAVs that operated with roughly a 6k-10k range is via EW."

EW has been brought up a few times now in this thread. I know both side have been able to defeat UAVs with EW on occasion during this conflict. However, I also know that the Russians have lost a lot of costly EW gear to Ukraine: EW is inherently vulnerable because EW lights up the world with RF signatures that get targeted. Also, despite the large amount of EW gear that Russia has employed, they lose lots of tanks, IFVs and men to hobby grade drones every day. Russian EW hasn't been able to stop that.

So I question EW and whether it can really deliver against systems that rely on RF. Then, when you get to fully autonomous systems that don't rely on RF at all, I write EW off as next to pointless.

[greedo]

It's important to remember that all of the videos on YT only show successful attacks. Ukraine is reportedly burning through 10k drones a month.

Russia was terrible at almost all phases of the invasion during the first year, but has really buttoned down in two areas; AD and EW. Russia has been a leader in EW for a long time and is slowly responding.

EW can't be everywhere though, and the smaller drones can avoid it in some situations since it's line of sight.

Also, don't mistake EW as just jamming. Sometimes it's taking over the control channel for a drone, or something even more esoteric like microwaves that fry the systems.