Ukraine’s innovative edge counters Russian mass, official says

NATIONAL HARBOR, Md. — The Ukrainian military is repelling attacks from numerically superior Russian forces by combining new-school inventiveness and technology with old-school tactics on the battlefield, according to one official.

While Moscow’s war machine dwarfs its neighbor, with more manpower and built-up materiel at its disposal, Kyiv has for nearly two years withstood bombardment in both the physical and digital worlds .

Maj. Gen. Borys Kremenetskyi, the defense attaché with the Embassy of Ukraine in the U.S., on Dec. 13 credited his besieged country’s endurance to an “asymmetric approach” that confronts volume and brute force with scrappiness and creativity. Hobbyist toys including first-person-view drones have been transformed into anti-armor and personnel weapons, and cellphones have become tools for detection of missiles and other overhead attacks.

“Innovation? It’s one of our advantages and our tools,” Kremenetskyi said at the Association of Old Crows conference south of Washington. “We in Ukraine do not have thousands of artillery tubes, thousands of cruise missiles.”

The U.S. and its European allies have sought to swing the balance in Ukraine’s favor, injecting billions of dollars of weapons, ammunition, combat vehicles and training into the fight. Norway on Wednesday promised to donate more National Advanced Surface-to-Air Missile Systems, or NASAMS, worth approximately $31 million.

The Pentagon, meanwhile, has committed Abrams tanks and High Mobility Artillery Rocket Systems , or HIMARS, among other high-profile and expensive technologies. Specialty unmanned aerial vehicles and jammers have also been earmarked for shipping overseas. The former has become emblematic of the Russia-Ukraine war as both sides try to spot, target and attack from relative safety.

A woman waves a sign in support of Ukraine during a demonstration blocks from the White House in February 2022. (Colin Demarest/C4ISRNET)

What’s working for Ukraine is to combine this new-age weaponry with innovation and a thorough understanding of past continental conflicts, Kremenetskyi said.

“This is a type of World War I, World War II, full-scale artillery warfare — plus UAVs, unmanned surface vehicles, electronic warfare , cyber and all the domains we have now,” he said.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy this week visited Washington, meeting with Pentagon officials and defense contractors in an effort to unlock additional support, namely air defenses.

Continued assistance is snagged in Congress as lawmakers debate a $61 billion supplemental package. Though Ukraine aid still enjoys majority bipartisan support in both the House and Senate , a handful of Republicans who previously voted to gird Kyiv are skeptical of appropriating additional sums of money.

“The main lesson I have from his speech is: We are going to fight,” Kremenetskyi said of Zelenskyy’s stateside address. “We do not have another plan, rather than fight. With whatever capabilities we have now, with whatever capabilities we can be provided by our partners, we are going to fight.”

Defense News reporter Bryant Harris contributed to this article.

Colin Demarest was a reporter at C4ISRNET, where he covered military networks, cyber and IT. Colin had previously covered the Department of Energy and its National Nuclear Security Administration — namely Cold War cleanup and nuclear weapons development — for a daily newspaper in South Carolina. Colin is also an award-winning photographer.

马里兰州国家港——据一位官员称，乌克兰军队正在将新式的创造力和技术与战场上的传统战术相结合，从而击退数量占优的俄罗斯军队的进攻。

尽管莫斯科的战争机器比邻国基辅大得多，拥有更多的人力和储备物资，但基辅在近两年的时间里，在现实世界和数字世界都经受住了猛烈的轰炸。

乌克兰驻美国大使馆国防武官鲍里斯·克列梅涅茨基少将12月13日表示，乌克兰之所以能在围困中坚持下来，是因为它采取了一种“非对称作战方式”，即以顽强拼搏和创造力来对抗数量庞大的敌人。包括第一人称视角无人机在内的业余玩具已被改造为反装甲和人员攻击武器，手机也成为了探测导弹和其他空中袭击的工具。

“创新？这是我们的优势和工具之一，”克列梅涅茨基在华盛顿南部举行的老乌鸦协会会议上说。“我们乌克兰没有成千上万门火炮，也没有成千上万枚巡航导弹。”

美国及其欧洲盟友一直试图扭转局势，使之向乌克兰倾斜，为此投入了数十亿美元的武器、弹药、作战车辆和训练。挪威周三承诺捐赠更多价值约3100万美元的“国家先进地对空导弹系统”（NASAMS）。

与此同时，五角大楼已承诺提供艾布拉姆斯坦克和高机动性火箭炮系统（HIMARS）等一系列备受瞩目且价格昂贵的技术装备。特种无人机和干扰器也已被列入海外运输计划。无人机已成为俄乌战争的标志性装备，双方都试图在相对安全的环境下进行侦察、瞄准和攻击。

2022年2月，一名女子在白宫附近街区举行的示威活动中挥舞标语，声援乌克兰。（Colin Demarest/C4ISRNET）

克列梅涅茨基表示，对乌克兰来说行之有效的方法是将这种新时代的武器与创新以及对过去大陆冲突的透彻理解结合起来。

他说：“这就像是第一次世界大战、第二次世界大战的全面炮兵战争——再加上无人机、无人水面舰艇、电子战、网络战以及我们现在所拥有的所有领域。”

本周，乌克兰总统泽连斯基访问了华盛顿，会见了五角大楼官员和国防承包商，以争取更多支持，特别是防空支持。

国会正在就一项610亿美元的补充援助方案进行辩论，导致对乌克兰的持续援助陷入僵局。尽管对乌克兰的援助在众议院和参议院仍获得两党多数支持，但一些此前投票支持援助基辅的共和党议员对追加拨款持怀疑态度。

克列梅涅茨基在谈到泽连斯基在美国的讲话时说：“我从他的讲话中得到的主要教训是：我们要战斗。除了战斗，我们别无选择。我们将用我们现在拥有的一切能力，用我们的伙伴能够提供的一切能力，去战斗。”

本文由《防务新闻》记者布莱恩特·哈里斯撰写。

科林·德马雷斯特曾是C4ISRNET的记者，负责报道军事网络、网络安全和信息技术方面的新闻。此前，他曾为南卡罗来纳州的一家日报报道美国能源部及其下属的国家核安全管理局，主要关注冷战后的清理工作和核武器研发。科林还是一位屡获殊荣的摄影师。