This does not bode well for Putin or Russia’s invasion, Russia can only strategically succeed in this summer offensive if it puts so much distributed pressure on the frontlines that Ukraine does not have the spare command capacity to leverage its superior, actually still mechanized, troops to counter attack and create local efficiencies for Ukraine that compound to a shift in momentum in the war in favor of Ukraine.
In otherwords Russia’s infantry have placed itself in an extremely vulnerable position where they must CONSTANTLY keep the pressure up or else Ukraine will use that window to flank the infantry with mechanized forces and categorically remove them from the war via encirclement.
The fact that this started happening in july and not late summer indicates to me how badly Russia is making a massive strategic blunder with this ill-equipped offensive, because when the momentum decisively shifts Russia won’t be able to respond and move their troops to concentrate defensively because they don’t have any transportation left. A thinly spread army with no transportation is toast up against a nimble, mechanized and coordinated counter attacking force.
Have you heard of the Aero Shark? I made a post about it here, I see great hope in platforms like that to protect Ukrainian cities and population from shahed style attacks and do so at a sustainably cost effective scale that can be quickly ramped up in production both domestically and with foreign partners.
https://en.defence-ua.com/video/ukraine_receives_first_shark_light_aircraft_with_anti_drone_ew_capability-32.html
I imagine with Ukraine’s state of the art drone production that there is the industrial expertise necessary for production of carbon fiber ultralight aircraft frames similar to the Aero Shark, it would be a natural next step in some ways for a lot of cutting edge carbon fiber production techniques for small to medium combat airframes I imagine and would compliment simultaneous carbon fiber drone production as well.
It is worth noting that the cost effectiveness of a platform like the Aero Shark produced with Ukraine’s UAV and small aircraft expertise that was tested and refined in a defense of Ukraine would immediately become a prime candidate for all kinds of non-military uses all over the world, especially in the context of rescue, disaster response and life saving operations in general. It is the kind of commitment to war that doesn’t put an entire industry heading towards a dead end when peace happens.
Also, the sky sentinel system - derived, built, and deployed in Ukraine by Ukrainians, it’s a networked, ML-driven M2B .50 cal on a fully gimballed autonomous mount that ties in to IADS for low-altitude cruise missile and drone defense. They’re apparently quite cheap (comparatively speaking) to set up, and very good at nailing shaheds.
Definitely, it is those very systems that are forcing Russia to raise the quality of its shaheds so they can fly higher to avoid heavy machine gun fire, but that very response in tactics makes shaheds incredibly vulnerable to ultralight electronics warfare, surveillance and jamming aircraft like the Aero Shark.
Thus these two weapon systems although they appear very different in nature and purpose are actually a natural compliment for Ukraine in a one two defensive punch against mass shahed drone attacks.