Drone Warfare in Ukraine: A Window onto the Red Army’s Doctrinal Concepts

Introduction

Marshal Nikolai Ogarkov was major figure of the Soviet military; he was promoted to Marshal of the Soviet Union in 1977 and was Chief of the General Staff of the USSR between 1977 and 1984. Ogarkov’s concept of nonlinear warfare (очаговый бой) is rooted in the acknowledgment that surveillance and long-range strike capabilities have become sophisticated enough to make ground troops’ concentration obsolete. In the early cold war, the growing development of the nuclear tactical arsenal endangered the resort to the concentration of troops. Initially, the Red Army’s response was to increase the mobility of its forces to address this challenge – this was one of the core goals of Georgy Zhukov’s reforms in the 1950s. However, innovations in the 1970s in surveillance, targeting, and deep-strike capabilities ultimately rendered troop concentrations obsolete. A modern army equipped with such sophisticated weapons and devices could target and destroy an enemy’s concentration of troops even before it reached the frontline. Furthermore, the long-range strike weapons became so precise and deadly that the mobility factor wasn’t enough to keep a great number of forces, concentrated on the ground, still relevant. The concept of nonlinear sought to address this growing challenge between the 1970s and the 1980s, by proposing an overhaul of the Red Army’s structures and doctrinal thinking.

N. Ogarkov, strongly aware of this evolution, called for a significant adaptation of the Red Army’s doctrine and structure to accommodate the new nature of warfare. The main idea was to invest in the modern surveillance, targeting, and long-range strike capabilities that would become the kernel of the Soviet army. At the same time, the size of ground forces would be reduced to well-qualified, highly flexible troops, able to succeed in tactical operations across a wide range of mission types. The front lines, which traditionally shaped the war theater, were called to be progressively blurred. Indeed, the weapon and device innovations of the 1970s unlocked the ability to strike almost any target, regardless of its position in the war theater. N. Ogarkov promoted surveillance and targeting systems, missiles, and anti-missile systems that would build up the Red Army’s readiness for nonlinear warfare. All the devices or systems that could improve, and make more efficient the networking process of surveillance, targeting, decision-making, strike, and Battle Damage Assessment (BDA) (the “kill chain” process put differently) would be prioritized.

In the 1990s, Major General Vladimir Slipchenko, following N. Ogarkov’s observations, developed his concept of Sixth Generation Warfare, claiming that warfare has entered a new age after the Gulf War. V. Slipchenko went further than N. Ogarkov, and postulated that advanced Intelligence Surveillance Reconnaissance (ISR) and long-range strike systems would cause the disappearance of traditional front lines, hence opening the age of contactless warfare (безконтактная война). According to V. Slipchenko, the changing nature of warfare is leading to the gradual obsolescence of traditional concepts such as the Forward Line of Own Troops (FLOT) and the Forward Line of Enemy Troops (FLET). Indeed, troop concentrations are easy to detect, easy to target, and easy to strike. The reduced concentration of ground forces, which is necessary for large-scale operational offensives, limits major maneuvers across the theater of war and therefore leads to a freezing of the frontline. The positional warfare on the operational level gives a greater role to the tactical level. Maneuver operations are transferred to the tactical level, as smaller amounts of ground forces are less threatened by strike systems. The operations focus on isolating enemy objectives through tactical encirclement.

Both Ogarkov and Slipchenko are major figures in the Red Army’s warfare-forecasting discipline, a legacy practice within the Russian military of theorizing about future war. They strived to analyze and identify the main features of future warfare, therefore trying to display the surmise nature of warfare. The ongoing war in Ukraine, which began in February 2022, has generated extensive analyses and is often regarded as a symbol of modern warfare. The growing role of drones in this war is one of the most striking features, which reveals much about the nature of contemporary conflict. In order to understand what the War in Ukraine has to teach us about modern warfare, this article will draw on Ogarkov and Slipchenko’s concepts to shed light on the impact of drones on the battlefield. It will be argued that the Red Army’s decades-old theoretical frameworks can still help us grasp the transformative effect of drones on warfare, particularly from the perspective of the Russian Armed Forces.

Russia’s Rebound to Several-Decades-Old Red Army Doctrine

The Russian Army offensive doctrine is inspired by nonlinear and contactless warfare concepts. This offensive doctrine observes that when a conflict stretches to the full depth of the enemy territory, the frontlines lose their structuring role over the war theater. Consequently, the new vision of the war theater becomes centered around targets and strikes. The challenge focuses on identifying, preventing, deterring, thwarting, and striking the foe’s key resources in order to take the upper hand and impose the chosen pace of operation. This doctrinal vision is exactly what both Ogarkov and Slipchenko described in their concepts; it illustrates that the Russian Army rebounds with these several-decades-old officers’ thoughts. The actual Russian doctrine advocates for offensive operations undertaken on the tactical level. These tactical offensives are supposed to open, later on, operational opportunities. The maneuver aims to achieve clear and specific goals in a limited area to achieve a tactical offensive. The goal of a tactical offensive is to destroy enemy forces in priority; indeed, gaining terrain is not necessarily the first goal of an offensive. The attack can also be motivated by the aim of disorganizing the enemy line of defense, preventing the enemy’s own offensive. The tactical offensive is mainly structured around the firepower: strike systems are aimed to overwhelm and paralyze the enemy’s targeted forces. The enemy will strike all along the depth of the war theater to destroy, damage, or undermine at the same time its frontline, its reserve troops, its supply lines, and its own strike systems. The Russian Armed Forces appear to draw heavily on the strategic concepts of Ogarkov and Slipchenko, particularly in their emphasis on precision strike systems, tactically confined offensive operations, and the in-depth understanding of the war theater.

The Russian Army defensive doctrine is also strongly influenced by both Ogarkov and Slipchenko’s concepts. Instead of a linear structure, the defensive structure is perceived as a flexible framework which is shaped by open flanks covered by the firepower, and enhanced by an efficient “kill chain”. The flexibility of the defensive framework is due to the extensive employment of counterattacks, strongholds, and obstacles. As nonlinear and contactless warfare advocates, the Russian Armed Forces rely on active defense. That is to say, back-and-forth movements between a first and second line of defense to lure the enemy forces into the first line. This line is severely struck by drones, artillery, aircraft, and helicopters; afterward, the counterattack from the second line repels the depleted enemy troops. The goal of this active defense is to protect key areas of the front while exhausting and depleting the enemy forces over time. The defense is not considered as a way to hold the line, but an opportunity to attrit the foe’s troops through endless back-and-forth tactical onslaughts and counterattacks.

This defensive doctrine is called positional defense, which has been thought of as an efficient way to protect a key zone, undergirded by a deep and organized line framework. The doctrinal decision to favor a flexible and active defense over passive and rigid defensive lines clearly reflects the legacy of Ogarkov and Slipchenko’s concepts, which emphasized that defensive operations should increasingly focus on the tactical level.

 Nonlinear warfare and contactless warfare also stress the importance of favoring maneuver for the ground troops’ sake, and to mainly rely on the firepower to deplete the enemy forces. During the Ukrainian 2023 offensive on the Zaporizhzhia front, the Russian Army showed the relevance of its defensive doctrine, deeply influenced by nonlinear and contactless warfare. After the first failures of the mechanized assaults, the Ukrainian Army shifted its strategy for small tactical groups of infantrymen attacking limited areas of the front to make a breakthrough. The Ukrainian forces faced the Russian elastic defense or positional defense. The advancing Ukrainian infantrymen were facing no resistance from the retreating Russian troops. This was followed by massive strikes on the positions attacked, as the coordinates were already saved by the Russian artillery. Once the strike finished, the Russian troops could wage a counterattack to roll back the depleted Ukrainian troops. The elastic defense or positional defense paralyzed the Ukrainian offensive into a tactical endless fighting, preventing any breakthrough and wider maneuver on the operational level.

To address the challenges of the war in Ukraine, the Russian Army choses to rely on its tradition and doctrinal heritage to find solutions. Moreover, the adoption of ideas from Ogarkov and Slipchenko was not an emergency response triggered solely by the 2022 failure. In fact, the Russian military has for years been developing a doctrine aimed at confronting the realities of modern warfare. In this context, the influence of thinkers like Ogarkov and Slipchenko—whose theories are taught in Russian military academies—remains central. Concepts such as nonlinear and contactless warfare are, in this regard, unavoidable references. It is no coincidence that Valery Gerasimov, speaking in 2019 at the Russian Academy of Military Sciences, described Russian military strategy as one of active defense. This remark illustrates the clear inspiration that modern Russian doctrine takes from concepts like nonlinear and contactless warfare, both of which advocate for an active defense posture.

The Recasting Effect of Drones on Russian Army Capabilities in the Context of Nonlinear and Contactless Warfare

Nonlinear warfare and contactless warfare highlight the need for the Armed Forces to display advanced and sophisticated ISR capabilities. According to these two concepts, modern warfare is characterized by the central role of strike with highly precise weapon systems, enabling the ability to destroy any target on the tactical, operational, and long-range (strategic) levels. Nonlinear and contactless warfare stress the ever-growing transparency over the battlefield enabled by ISR systems, more and more sophisticated, thus allowing an almost ubiquitous strike capability. Drones are a key asset for ISR capabilities by being a relatively cheap device, empowering a large range of missions such as intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance. Drones are fundamental enabler of transparency over the battlefield in Ukraine, used in the full depth of the war theater. Indeed, in the war in Ukraine, drones are playing a decisive role in bolstering the ISR capabilities as advocated by both nonlinear warfare and contactless warfare.

The “kill chain” is the backbone of the strike capability; the effectiveness of a strike relies on how this chain is efficient and fast. Both Ogarkov and Slipchenko believed that the growing sophistication of ISR systems, communication devices, and automated control-and-command systems would make the “kill chain” process increasingly faster. The objective was to achieve an advanced “kill chain” in which only a few minutes elapsed between target identification and its destruction. Drones also have an impact on the “kill chain”: these devices are a great resource to increase the speed of the chain process. Especially because drones facilitate the ISR part of the chain, but also the communication of the data, the decision-making, and the BDA phase. The implementation of AI and the growing use of swarm tactics are the next step of the “kill chain” improvement; again, drones endorse the role of enhancing by being implemented with such new technologies.

Finally, Slipchenko’s concept of contactless warfare forecasted what has since become a trend in modern warfare: the growing robotization of the manpower. He anticipated that, through technological innovations, robots would become more and more efficient and autonomous, thus leading their number to relentlessly expand. Robotization is a significant development, since replacing humans with robots in manpower further enforces the contactless nature of warfare, by reducing human direct involvement on the battlefield. Again, drones, which are becoming more and more autonomous, are radically modifying the structures of the Armed Forces engaged in the conflict. Therefore, the increasing number of drones and scale of their missions contribute to the unceasing robotization of the Armed Forces.

The Recasting Effect of Drones on the Battlefield of the War in Ukraine in the Context of Nonlinear and Contactless Warfare

Ogarkov and Slipchenko forecasted the blurring and the progressive obsolescence of concepts such as FLET or FLOT. The ubiquitous strike capability and the advanced ISR systems would enable the Armed Forces to identify, target, and destroy anything regardless of its position on the frontline or in the rear. This leads to the creation of a battlefield without a safe zone, with an unlimited grey or kill zone. The resort to drones in the Ukraine War led to such an evolution where the strike flexibility is blurring the concept of frontlines. For instance, the expanding range of action tactical drones acquired over time contributes to increasing the grey zone toward the tactical supply lines. Indeed, the safety zone is repelled, thus modifying the way defense and offense are organized. Hence, cities, infrastructures, ports, air bases, warehouses, and railways are war targets, regardless of how far they are from the frontline.

Nonlinear warfare and contactless warfare stress the fact that modern warfare is radically different from the past because offensive and defensive operations are deeply transformed. The almost ubiquitous ISR systems and strike capabilities tend to make ground troops’ concentration outdated: easy to identify, target, and strike. The supply lines of such an important concentration of troops are centralized, thus easy to strike as well. Drones, in Ukraine, are shaping the war as both Ogarkov and Slipchenko theorized. The ISR missions and “kill chain” enhanced by drones greatly endanger troop concentration. Additionally, waging an offensive becomes highly dangerous, as the transparency over the battlefield, the strike capabilities, and the unsafe concentration of troops make the planning of an offensive difficult. The widespread presence of drones radically modified how offensive operations are waged: they are mainly organized on the tactical level, achieving limited successes that are expected to entail consequences on the operational level. Therefore, offensive endorses the face of multiple limited operations along the frontlines, all coordinated together, slowly creating a bigger picture on the operational level. The Russian Army relies on the strategy of positional defense, leveraging drones’ strengths to sustain it.

Conclusion

This paper explored the concepts of nonlinear warfare and contactless warfare, demonstrating how drones contribute to similarly shaping warfare in line with the narratives of these concepts. Slipchenko, influenced by Ogarkov’s previous work, promoted the development, in the Soviet and the Russian Army, after 1991, of a doctrinal branch dedicated to forecasting future warfare. Slipchenko and other officers, such as Makhmut Gareïev, advocated for the reform of the Russian Army according to a thorough analysis of future conflicts’ surmised characteristics. They announced a great change in the manner war would be fought, describing a long process of evolution driven by technological innovations; inspired in this way by Jan Gotlib Bloch’s six-volume-long Future War and its Economic Consequences (Будущая война и её экономические последствия) published in 1898. Drones can be considered as a symptom, a part of a greater and longer process spreading over decades. Drones are only a gear, with other technological innovations, of warfare’s long evolution. The nature of war has been changing for decades. Drones are one symptom of this profound transformation, but they should not be mistaken for the transformation itself. Indeed, the use of drones falls more within the characteristics of warfare rather than the nature of warfare. As such, their role is expected to evolve significantly from one conflict to another.

The Russian Army’s failures in the early stages of the war forced it to acknowledge the unsuitability of its armored offensives, notably the bitter, repeated attack attempts in Vuhledar (winter 2023). These shortcomings apparently pushed the Russian Army to rebound with older doctrinal concepts. These concepts identify modern warfare’s characteristics, such as the effect of weapons on the balance of forces or the evolution of the battlefield structure, in order to profile war’s nature. This effort led to advocating for an army model and a doctrinal practice capable of recognizing warfare’s features and adapting accordingly, instead of applying on the battlefield an abstract vision of combat that fails to account for the full complexity of modern war.

The failure of the armored column assaults in the Zaporizhzhia region in summer 2023 taught exactly the same lesson to the Ukrainian Armed Forces. These armored assaults were carried out according to NATO-style maneuver tactics. This raises legitimate questions about the relevance of the Alliance’s offensive practices in modern warfare. It remains to be seen whether Western armies will have to learn the hard way, through the blood of their soldiers, as the Russian and Ukrainian militaries did, the inadaptability of their tactics, or whether a deep doctrinal overhaul can spare that cost.

Check out everything Small Wars Journal has to offer.

The post Drone Warfare in Ukraine: A Window onto the Red Army’s Doctrinal Concepts appeared first on Small Wars Journal by Arizona State University.