Nov-Dec 2024 HIGHLIGHTS

• The Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) have prioritized preemptive strategies against Hamas,
  focusing on neutralizing drone threats and maintaining air superiority.
• The use of drones in urban environments, such as Gaza, presents unique operational
  challenges and opportunities.
• Although a cease-fire may be possible sometime soon, the long-term Russian threat means
  Ukraine’s defense technology sector will remain active for years to come.
• Russia’s wire-guided FPV drones are making an impact on the battlefield, underscoring an
  effective defense against EW jamming.
• Winter weather imposes restrictions on Ukraine’s drone warfare operations — but opens up
  new opportunities, too.
• Each of Taiwan’s military branches has a key role to play in the island nation’s defense.
• Taiwan’s development of unmanned platforms is a key part of its plan to defend against
  and deter China’s rising threats.
• Inspired by Ukraine, Recently, Taiwan is developing "Unmanned Surface Ships,” or
  USVs.

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EDITORS NOTE

While Ukraine remains the world’s most exemplary case study in drone warfare, it is far from the
only one. Drones have played and continue to play pivotal roles in conflicts worldwide. And
commercial leaps in drone technology promise to have far-reaching, game-changing effects on the
future hotspots of great power competition.

When Islamist rebels staged a surprising, lightning takeover of Aleppo last week, their operation
included the use of small drones to coordinate strikes against the Syrian army. As of this report’s
release, that rebel advance threatens to topple the murderous regime of Bashar al-Assad and expel
the Russian military from its Syrian stronghold — seismic events in a region that’s seen no lack of
attacks over the past 14 months.

A few hundred miles to the south, Israeli forces routinely use a range of small drones for ISR and
strike operations within Gaza’s urban warscape. At the same time, Hamas and Hezbollah continue
to expand their combat use of unmanned systems, our team member in Israel reports, adding:
“Adversarial innovations, particularly from Hamas and Hezbollah, continue to challenge Israel's
defense strategies.”

In this edition of the Vector Report, our Israeli team member outlines some of the lessons learned
from Israel’s experience of drone warfare in urban environments.

To the northeast of Israel, in the open expanses of Jordan, Syria, and northern Iraq, Iran-backed
militants launched waves of drone attacks against U.S. forces and outposts in the weeks following
Hamas’s Oct. 7, 2023 massacre. On Jan. 28, 2024, a kamikaze drone launched by one of these
militant groups killed three U.S. service members and wounded dozens more at a facility in
northeast Jordan, CENTCOM reported.

While notable for its lethality, the Jan. 28 attack was part of a larger, ongoing trend of irregular
adversaries using drones to strike U.S. forces and other strategic targets in the Middle East,
including international shipping in the Strait of Hormuz and Saudi Arabian oil installations. And one shouldn’t forget how Islamic State militants nearly broke the Iraqi army’s will to fight during
the 2016 Battle of Mosul through a relentless bombing campaign prosecuted by small, weaponized,
commercial drones.

Further east in the thin air of the high Himalayas, drones are re-shaping India’s longtime standoffs
against Chinese and Pakistani forces. Spurred by its rival neighbors’ drone warfare advancements,
India has spent hundreds of millions of dollars since 2022 to fast-track its unmanned programs.
In a June 2024 op-ed, a retired Indian Army lieutenant general named H S Panag called on India to
do much more to integrate drones into every layer of India’s military. Panag wrote: “Drones are
probably the most versatile force multiplier ever seen on the battlefield ...The employment of
drones must be dovetailed into all operational activity — tactical movement,
surveillance/reconnaissance, combined arms fire planning and combat.”

India’s Himalayan border with China and Pakistan is a region that perpetually teeters on the edge
of open conflict. Troops encamped at remote mountain outposts endure a gut-punch of
environmental extremes, including thin air, temperatures that dip down to polar extremes, and
hurricane-force winds. To defend its rugged frontiers, India is rapidly expanding the scope of its
drone operations with a focus on swarm technology and AI-based surveillance.
According to some South Asian military affairs commentators, the rapid pace of drone warfare
advancements could disrupt the tenuous status quo in the contested Himalayan border region
between India, Pakistan, and China. An October 2024 article in South Asian Voices, a policy
platform hosted by the Stimson Center that addresses regional geopolitical issues, highlighted these
risks. Focusing on relations between India and Pakistan, the authors wrote:
“Both India and Pakistan have been heavily investing in drones, which are increasingly being
viewed not only as tactical assets but also as strategic tools capable of influencing the balance of
power in the region. As drones become integral to militaries around the world, the potential for
miscalculation, unintended escalation, and destabilization in future confrontations grows.”

Describing the Indian army’s failure to detect Chinese troop movements along a contested
Himalayan frontier region, H S Panag, the retired Indian Army lieutenant general, wrote: “[W]hy is
there no drone overwatch for all tactical/road movements and operations in Jammu & Kashmir?
Why are troops and convoys being ambushed when drone-based thermal sensors can detect even
camouflaged terrorists in forest areas?”

There are other potential flashpoints for instability in the Himalayas that U.S. policymakers should
have on their radars. This author recently returned from a six-week field research trip in Nepal’s
Himalayas to study the Tibetan resistance. During that time, I embarked on a multi-week, solo hike
across the Himalayas along the route used by refugees to escape Chinese-occupied Tibet into
Nepal. Interviews with Tibetan refugees illuminated current trends in China’s Orwellian
surveillance measures within the Tibetan Autonomous Region (offering us, perhaps, a snapshot of
China’s occupation strategy for Taiwan). These interviews also foreshadowed the likelihood of
unrest within Tibet should a Sino-American war erupt over Taiwan — or when China inevitably handpicks its successor to the Dalai Lama, Tibet’s 89-year-old spiritual leader and the torchbearer of Tibetan resistance since the 1950s.

The Tibetan refugees I interviewed told remarkable stories of hiking over the Himalayas in jeans
and tennis shoes, risking altitude sickness, frostbite, and lethal falls from the vertiginous terrain, all
while evading Chinese military patrols. It truly is a testament to the allure of freedom to learn what
people will endure to achieve it.

During my time in the Himalayas, I also encountered innovative civilian drone use cases with
obvious military applications. One such example was a joint venture between the Chinese drone
company, DJI, and a Nepalese drone service company called Airlift to use drones to deliver
supplies to high camps on Mount Everest. During a test flight in April 2024, a DJI FlyCart 30
heavy-lift drone delivered three oxygen canisters along with 1.5 kg of other supplies from Everest
base camp to camp one — a flight that went from 5,300 meters (17,388 feet) to over 6,000 meters
(19,685 feet) in altitude. On the return leg to base camp, the drone reportedly ferried 15 kg of trash.

This year, mountaineers also used a DJI Mavic 3 Pro to shoot video footage over Everest’s summit
— reaching an altitude of about 30,000 feet.

In a mountainous, high-altitude war zone, these performance capabilities could transform logistics,
as well as the means of delivering precision strikes. They also offer new ways to provide constant
ISR coverage in areas notorious for inclement weather and geological obstructions.

To the east of the Himalayas in Myanmar’s forested, hilly terrain, rebels have used small, low-cost
drones to score significant breakthroughs against the junta. In return, Myanmar’s military has
weaponized small, commercial drones “to carry out a torrent of deadly strikes against rebel forces
and civilians,” The Washington Post reported in October.

Going farther east, Japan’s Mitsubishi Heavy Industries is studying the war in Ukraine to
develop new, advanced UAVs to complement its most advanced manned fighter jets — one aspect
of Japan’s broader push to militarize against the growing Chinese threat. As our team member reports from Taiwan this week, drones are central to the island nation's strategy for repelling a
potential Chinese amphibious invasion. To that end, Taiwan is developing new unmanned maritime
and aerial vehicles for a variety of combat missions.
"In maritime and amphibious operations, [drones] are crucial in enhancing Taiwan's defensive
capabilities," our team member writes, highlighting the pivotal role of unmanned technologies in
Taiwan's defense strategy.

Next, we cross the Pacific to the U.S. southern border, where Mexican cartels employ small drones
to smuggle drugs into the American homeland and use signal-disrupting counter-drone systems to
evade U.S. Customs and Border Protection surveillance drones. And within America’s borders,
prison guards search for counter-drone solutions to combat the use of small drones to ferry
contraband to inmates. These scenarios reflect the constant duel between “sword and shield” on
Ukraine’s battlefields — the tit-for-tat contest between drone and counter-drone tactics and
technologies.

Our brief survey of global drone usage brings us back to Ukraine's battlefields, where, nearly three
years into full-scale war and over a decade since Russia's initial invasion, Ukrainians continue to
rely on unmanned technologies to counter critical shortages in manpower and materiel against their
Russian adversaries.

In this war, drones haven’t replaced any weapons systems (yes, Elon, manned fighter jets remain
relevant). Rather, they continue to complement and amplify existing weapons systems and military
formations. ISR drones, for example, have increased the accuracy of artillery fire and reduced the
number of shells wasted to missed shots. FPV strike drones offer a low-cost, scalable solution to
Ukraine’s chronic lack of manpower. FPVs have also partially compensated for Ukraine’s lack of
short-range air defenses. According to some Ukrainian sources, Ukrainian air-interceptor FPVs are
now downing about 400 to 500 Russian ISR drones a month. That’s a staggering number when one
remembers that at the outset of the full-scale war, Russian officials boasted that they possessed a
few thousand ISR drones across their entire force.

Ukraine’s meteoric acceleration of drone manufacturing is one useful metric by which to measure
the indispensability of small drones to Ukraine’s overall war effort. In 2022, Ukraine’s overall
drone production capacity was about 3,000 to 5,000 drones per year, according to a recent study by
the Kyiv School of Economics. By 2023, that number shot up to an annual production capacity of
about 3 million drones. In 2024, it rose again to 4 million per year.

Now, we should note that these numbers represent Ukraine’s drone production capacity — an
output potential that is capped by the “Ukrainian government’s procurement capacity,” the KSE
report noted. Even so, Kyiv’s stated goal in 2024 was to produce 1 million drones. By November,
officials reported that more than 1.3 million drones had already been made, and the overall number
for the year is likely to reach 1.5 or 1.6 million drones. These numbers dwarf America’s production
capacity for similar drones, which, according to industry reports, remains in the low thousands.

Ukraine truly has become the drone arsenal of democracy — and with plenty of untapped potential
left waiting in the wings, based on the delta between Ukraine’s production capacity and actual
output. Still, you’d be hard-pressed to find a Ukrainian soldier who’d prefer a $500 FPV drone orbiting overhead in his defense rather than a $100 million F-35 fighter. Again, drones do not
replace airpower and artillery; they complement and amplify their effects.

Ukraine’s battlefields are an ecosystem that naturally selects winning tactics and technologies. As
Ukrainian soldiers and their Russian enemies settle in for another winter at war, this so-called
frozen conflict also offers us an ongoing case study in extremely cold weather warfare. These
lessons are of particular importance now that the Arctic has become a new arena for great power
competition and with NATO’s expansion to include Finland and Sweden.

Traveling throughout Ukrainian positions on the eastern front lines in winter, one imagines the
suffering that soldiers in Napoleon Bonaparte’s army must have endured fighting in this region, as
well as what German and Soviet troops endured while fighting over this land in World War II. The
white, overcast sky seems to blend in with the open, snow-covered fields, which divide the
Ukrainian troops from their enemies. It is painfully cold, with temperatures dipping double digits
below zero at night. Biting winds easily cut through layers of fleece and down. Uncovered fingers
quickly go numb, and no matter how well dressed you may be for the cold, time spent outdoors
must be moderated to avoid frostbite or hypothermia.

Apart from testing the physiology and grit of the soldiers who endure it, these extreme conditions
also impose unique demands and constraints on drone warfare operations. Battery life is reduced.
Leafless trees mean less natural concealment to hide from enemy drones. Disturbances in the snow
— such as foot tracks or trash, as well as any sources of heat — can be dead giveaways to enemy
surveillance drones orbiting overhead.

Winter in eastern Ukraine also often means gray skies and overcast days, forcing drones to fly
lower and to be more exposed to enemy fire. The shorter daylight hours also bias drone operations
toward the use of nighttime sensors.

In this edition, our writer in Ukraine explains the requirements of drone warfare during Ukraine’s
notoriously frigid winters, foreshadowing how drone warfare might be adapted for the Arctic.
“As the full-scale war nears its third anniversary, the Ukrainian military is preparing for another
hard winter. Although tactics and technology have advanced at unprecedented speeds, some things don’t change. And lessons learned from previous winters will go to good use,” our team member in
Ukraine writes.

Changing climate conditions have steadily eroded the extent of the Arctic ice cap, opening up
previously unavailable nautical passages to the north of Greenland. New Russian icebreakers have
also made these more northern passages more practical, and Moscow is building or refurbishing
dozens of airfields across the Arctic.

China, too, has set its sights on the Arctic region. In January 2018, Beijing’s so-called Polar Silk
Road Arctic strategy declared China to be a “near-Arctic state” — even though China’s nearest
territory to the Arctic is some 900 miles away.

According to a report published this week by the Center for European Policy Analysis, or CEPA:
“The Arctic is ripe for contestation with emerging and disruptive technologies. The regional threat
environment requires new technologies to better identify threats, especially low-intensity warfare
activities coming from Russia and China, as well as to achieve overall domain awareness.”

For their part, U.S. Marines have increased the frequency of their extreme cold weather training in
Norway, and U.S. Global Strike Command now routinely operates strategic bomber task force
missions through Arctic airspace. Alaska, America’s northernmost territory, is today home to more
advanced fighter jets than any other state.

With multiple hot wars and other ones primed to erupt, the world today is a dangerous place.
Meanwhile, the U.S. homeland faces unprecedented, irregular threats from non-state actors as well
as conventional adversaries. And at the center of all this is the ever-expanding role that small
drones play in practically every threat faced by the U.S. and our allies — spanning all the Earth’s
environmental zones.

The next war may come sooner than we imagine, and there are plenty of places where it could start.
And when the next war comes, there won’t be time to learn on the job or to slowly spin up new
technologies and tactics over years of low-intensity warfare. We must be ready on day one to
dominate our adversaries, whoever they are, wherever they are. At Vector, that’s our mission.

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