The drone war in Ukraine steadily continues to develop on a scale most of us couldn’t have imagined a couple of years ago.
While the Ukrainians, as well as the Russians, invest plenty of time and resources into constantly improving already existing loitering munitions and reconnaissance drones, they are also inventing new types of drones — most recently the “Dragon’s Breath” drone, as well as interceptor drones.
Interceptor drones are part of the answer to the question of how we not only counter drones, but how we counter them effectively or at particularly low cost.
Even though the concept of intercepting primarily more expensive reconnaissance drones with other much cheaper drones is not new and was already tested in 2023, such plans were only put into practice on a large scale this year and there has been a clear increase in such documented cases, especially in recent weeks.
While this is of course a great success for the Ukrainian army in terms of countering Russian ISR capabilities, it also means a lot of work and adaptation for the manufacturers of reconnaissance drones which are supplied to the Ukrainian army.
One of these companies is Quantum Systems. Although the German company is young and small compared to defence giants such as Rheinmetall or Diehl Defence, its ambitions and dedication are at least as great.
Major General Christian Freuding, Head of the Situation Centre Ukraine in the German Ministry of Defence, recently said that Germany has young drone companies that produce highly valued products that prove themselves in combat every day.
Above all, this likely refers to the Vector eVTOL UAV produced by Quantum Systems, which is the flagship of drone deliveries to Ukraine financed by the German government.
Nearly 350 of these reconnaissance drones — each system costing around €200,000 — have so far been delivered to Ukraine to assist in the fight against the Russian aggression.
While according to Oryx — which only counts visually confirmed losses — only a single drone has been lost so far, the real number is probably around a third of so far supplied drones, i.e. over 110 Vector UAVs, which have been lost due to Russian EW and other air defence measures.
To protect the drones still in use against the new threat of Russian interceptor drones, Quantum Systems has come up with a simple but more or less effective solution for a quick improvement: decals!
With the retrofit decals, the German drone manufacturer is utilising the age-old but, of course, still highly effective tactic of camouflage. Following the principle: It’s much harder for the Russians to intercept drones if they can’t see them!
This is not just a clever idea, but concrete plans that have already been tested in Ukraine.
These tests must have been successful, as in the future they will be offering super-lightweight decals in different colour schemes depending on the season and geography, to meet the needs of all operators at all times!
Image: Quantum Systems
Image: Quantum SystemsWhile these retrofit decal sets — judging by the image, each consisting of 15 pieces to camouflage a single drone — are of course a quick, cheap, and easy to implement solution to the problem, in practice they will likely only have a limited effect.
Still, an improvement, even if it is just a small one, is a step in the right direction and could have a great impact. Just imagine that thanks to the decals, every tenth intercept could be prevented, and a Vector UAV could fly an additional mission.
So this one drone could end up being responsible for providing the data which leads to the destruction of a valuable Russian air defence system, a self-propelled artillery system or something of similar value. All thanks to a few decals!
Unfortunately, no further details are available, which is of course understandable given the circumstances.
For example, it is not known how much such a decal set would cost, or whether concrete talks are already underway with the Ukrainian or German Ministry of Defence to retrofit the Vector UAVs that have already been delivered or the ones which will be delivered in the future.
However, it shows above all that the topic of drones against EW and now also interceptor drones is a cat-and-mouse game and that companies are working non-stop on solutions to issues which the Ukrainian operators are encountering on the battlefield.
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