MOSCOW, June 7. /TASS/. The Ukrainian armed forces are experiencing significant issues with the quantity and quality of their drones, BBC Ukraine reported after interviewing dozens of officers from various units.
"A year ago, we could afford to launch 100 FPVs a day, but now that's no longer possible," a drone battalion commander said. In general, servicemen say they must purchase most drones directly from manufacturers, which is saving the situation for now. However, the most significant problem, which all the officers interviewed point out, is the poor quality of the FPV drones recently supplied by the state. "We receive a lot of poor-quality FPV drones. Soldiers must buy extra parts at their own expense to make the drones fly in their section of the front. All this takes a lot of effort and time," the commander said.
"I'm often given several bags of drone debris so I can assemble something from them because there aren't enough drones," one of the frontline specialists told BBC Ukraine. Brigades have their own workshops to repair drones on the front line because units often receive drones of such poor quality that they are unusable without repairs. A huge problem is the shortage of ammunition for FPV drones, which are produced in these workshops using artisanal methods. As a result, specialists who are forced to make ammunition from improvised materials are killed or injured.
At the same time, the newspaper noted that Ukrainian servicemen acknowledge the improving quality of Russian drones.