Modern warfare is experiencing a technological shift, particularly evident on the battlefield of trench warfare. Autonomous drone technologies and electronic warfare (EW) systems are significantly altering combat methods.
A few decades ago, the key factors in war were simply firing range and camouflage. Today, precision targeting and rapid response to threats have become the primary weapons. Let’s delve into how these technologies are reshaping traditional trench warfare strategies.
Autonomous vehicles, particularly drones and EW systems, are fundamentally changing modern trench combat strategies by providing new opportunities for reconnaissance, strikes, and protection.
Drones – A New Era of Reconnaissance & Strikes
According to a report by the International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS), global military technology spending increased by 3.6% in 2023, surpassing $2.24 trillion. A significant portion of this budget is directed toward the development of autonomous vehicles for reconnaissance, logistics, and combat support. But new types of affordable and mass-produced drones make it irrelevant to rely on the bigger budget, as strategic advantage.
Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) play a critical role in modern warfare due to their asymmetrical advantage. First of all, they provide precise information on enemy positions and enable targeted strikes at a significantly lower cost per mission, and this, in turn, compels both parties to adjust their strategies.
- Thanks to drones, soldiers now dig deeper into the ground, creating not just trenches but entire networks of strongpoints. This provides better protection from air attacks and drone strikes, allowing for more effective long-term defense. It makes attacking this position extremely costly when using conventional artillery or regular armed vehicles.
- Drones also enable highly accurate strikes, making traditional "carpet bombing" tactics less effective. According to multiple reports, drones enable more selective targeting with less collateral damage, improving the accuracy and timeliness of strikes compared to conventional artillery (MDPI). FPV-type unmanned vehicles significantly impact the cost-to-strike ratio, sometimes achieving a rate of 500 to 1. Their effectiveness can scale up to 100 times, reducing timelines from years to mere months compared to the use of ammunition for conventional artillery.
- Reconnaissance drones have advanced significantly. Rather than relying on a single strategic UAV for real-time ground broadcasts, it is more effective to conduct 10 to 100 smaller tactical or operational ISR missions, where the cost of an air defense missile is often the same or even higher than that of the drone itself.
Today, each brigade has a commander, mortar teams, infantry, and now a reconnaissance-strike UAV unit. Every unit has its drone division. This significantly changes war strategies, as now we have eyes in the sky and can fire with great accuracy.
Electronic Warfare (EW) – A Key Element of Defense
With the rapid development of UAV technology, the need for defense against enemy UAV attacks has emerged. This is where electronic warfare systems come into play. Trench-based EW has become as essential to military gear as body armour.
EW systems provide protection against UAVs by jamming their navigation and data transmission systems, reducing the effectiveness of enemy strike drones. According to military sources, most vehicles in conflict zones today are equipped with at least three antennas that emit a range of jamming signals (elements of EW) on three primary frequencies, neutralizing enemy UAVs within a 50-150 meter radius. This creates an "invisible war zone" of electronic warfare, which has significantly impacted trench warfare strategies.
As modern warfare demands a large number of affordable, mass-produced solutions for reconnaissance, strikes, and EW, this concept is discussed in various articles, including one from the Lexington Institute, which emphasizes the need for such solutions to meet contemporary military challenges.
For more detailed reading, you can explore sources like the Lexington Institute's article on "Affordable Mass" and a policy paper by Col. Mark Gunzinger from the Mitchell Institute.
Information Exchange Systems & Changing Approaches to Combat
Recently, the volume of information needed to make quick and effective decisions on the battlefield has significantly increased. The speed of sharing this information between units has become critical to the success of operations.
The means of attack have evolved from costly and inaccurate artillery strikes to affordable and highly precise drones and munitions that can carry out missions with maximum efficiency. In modern warfare, the key indicator of drone and other autonomous system effectiveness is not their base cost but the cost of completing the mission – reconnaissance, targeting, or defense.
For example, consider the task of searching, detecting, and striking targets in the area of interest using UAVs. Currently, this process is slow and inefficient, consisting of the following steps:
- Launching reconnaissance drones to collect information (flying along predefined coordinates).
- Processing the collected data (photos) to identify the location of enemy equipment.
- A different unit plans strikes based on the coordinates provided by the reconnaissance flights. This process involves:
- Data analysis: The gathered coordinates are checked for accuracy and relevance.
- Strike decision: Command decides whether to strike the detected objects based on the processed data.
- Attack planning: The type of weapon, number of shells, time, and attack direction are determined, considering potential risks and success probabilities.
- Coordination with other units: Interaction between artillery, reconnaissance, and other involved units is ensured to synchronize actions and avoid errors.
- Drones without communication fly missions, and after returning, the video data is analyzed to confirm the accuracy of the strikes.
If units work within a unified information exchange system, this process will not only be accelerated but will also demonstrate high KPI results. The process would include:
- Launching ground-based reconnaissance to create situational awareness.
- Deploying a UAV scout to confirm the detected target.
- If the target is confirmed, a strike UAV is launched to carry out the attack.
- Mission completion with the scout confirming the strike's results.
- Automatic data updates in the system for further analysis and planning.
This transformation signifies the shift from costly and imprecise artillery to affordable and accurate drones and munitions, capable of executing missions with maximum efficiency. The emphasis is now on the cost of mission completion, not the individual components. The ability to integrate and automate information exchange systems gives a significant advantage in modern trench warfare strategies.
Thus, we can assert that:
The means of attack have evolved from expensive and inaccurate artillery strikes to affordable and highly precise drones and munitions capable of executing tasks with maximum efficiency. In the new era of warfare, the key indicator of effectiveness for drones and other autonomous systems is not their base cost but the cost of completing the mission – be it reconnaissance, strike, or defense.
This shift means that technologies are rapidly becoming cheaper and more widespread, making the race for technological superiority one of the main components of success. The greatest advantage will go to those nations that can optimize the use of these technologies by creating not just individual products but entire systems for information exchange, defense, and attack.
Conclusion
Trench warfare will never be the same as it was before.
The winner in this new reality will be the one who can most effectively integrate new technologies, testing them in active combat zones in Ukraine and Israel. Modern wars are won not through isolated innovations but by building comprehensive systems where every element – drones, EW systems, and munitions – works as part of a unified mechanism.
Drones and EW systems now determine combat effectiveness, reducing the need for large artillery strikes and increasing precision. The scalability and affordability of these technologies are becoming decisive success factors. The key metric is not the cost of a drone or an EW system, but the total cost of mission execution. In the future, trench warfare strategies will depend on automated systems that rapidly exchange information and ensure target precision.
Featured image copyright © IEEE Spectrum
