How Ukrainian sea drones work - and why they terrify the Russian fleet | Defence in Depth

War is an inherently human business. Much of it takes place in the mind. Shatter your enemy’s will to fight and the physical bit becomes a lot easier.

Most soldiers accept the hurly burly of the battlefield. They understand the risks and have reconciled themselves to the possibility of death or injury by bullets, artillery and such like with grim pragmatism. But unseen killers - chemical weapons, booby traps, weapons that don’t play by the Queensberry rules of warfare - these eat away at a soldier’s psychological strength.

Loitering munitions in the air or at sea fit into this category of weapon. They’re deadly, but pretty cheap and basic, so easy to produce in large numbers, and able to attack psychological defences just as much as physical ones.

Ukraine’s innovation of maritime drone technology hasn’t fundamentally changed the nature of warfare at sea, but has shown how the psychological dimension can be employed here too.