The Russians Are Deploying Horse Drones Now
At least one regiment is equipping cavalry with cameras and satellite terminals
Desperate to break through the wall of drones that impedes Russian advances along many sectors of the 700-mile front line in Ukraine, last year some Russian regiments tried something truly desperate.
They revived horse cavalry. A kind of military formation that hasn’t been relevant in more than a century.
The first appearances of Russian horse troopers have generally ended in tragedy for the riders and, less often, their horses. But the Russians aren’t quite ready to give up on the idea.
And they’ve even deployed what is, for lack of a better term, a “horse drone.” That is, a horse equipped with a camera and a Starlink satellite terminal. The idea, it seems, is for that horse to relay live video to the cavalry headquarters the way a drone might do for some other unit.
The argument in favor of 21st-century horse cavalry is straightforward if not sound. Armored vehicles are big fat targets for the tiny explosive drones that are everywhere all the time along the front line, so it’s better for infantry to find less noticeable modes of transport.
As Russia’s wider war on Ukraine grinds toward its fifth year, most of the most successful Russian assaults come on foot. Small groups of infantry stand a better chance of sneaking across the wide no-man’s-land and accumulating inside the urban ruins of some artillery-blasted town or city.
But the infantry’s successes aren’t cost-free. Last year, Russia’s annual combat fatalities may have exceeded 100,000 for the first time. The Kremlin is now struggling to mobilize enough fresh troops every month to make good its losses.
It might help if the infantry could move faster across the no-man’s-land. Motorcycle assaults work, so why wouldn’t cavalry also work?
