Ukraine’s drone-saturated “zero line” is so dangerous that troops may have to wait days for a safe chance to move just a few hundred meters, a Ukrainian soldier told Business Insider.
The soldier, who uses the call sign Yankee, said that he has experienced cases at the zero line, the forward edge of the front line, where “if you want to sometimes move 300 meters, you can’t move for seven days.”
Moving even that short distance, he said, “can be like a question of life and death.” Troops may need favorable weather, electronic-warfare support, and coordination among several Ukrainian units before attempting it.
“You need to make sure you have a cover of radio frequencies. The radio frequencies of the drones are put down,” he said.
Doing so can involve Ukrainian electronic-warfare teams detecting and jamming frequencies used by Russian drones, disrupting their operators’ ability to control the aircraft or receive video. Such operations require coordination to avoid interfering with Ukraine’s own drones.
Weather also matters.
“The weather is the main component of it. If the weather is not right, you’re not going to make it,” Yankee said. “So you need either fog, rain, or wind that is 14 meters per second, at least, to do this. So you need to wait for the right conditions.”
Fog and rain can obscure drone cameras, while strong winds can make some drones harder to launch and control.
Yankee spoke with Business Insider at Operation Legio, a Norway-led multinational program training and equipping Ukrainian land forces in Poland. He said he was learning NATO standards and tactics to use when he returns to Ukraine.
Yankee serves as a battery sergeant in a front-line unit equipped with man-portable air-defense systems, or MANPADS. These shoulder-fired missiles can engage drones, missiles, and low-flying aircraft. His unit provides air defense at the zero line and along routes leading to it, he said.
Nina Liashonok/Ukrinform/NurPhoto via Getty Images
The zero line is the point where Ukrainian soldiers are closest to Russian forces. It is the forwardmost part of the battlefield, where the opposing armies may engage each other directly. Soldiers in this perilous part of the battlefield must remain concealed from enemy troops and the drones searching for them.
The drone and weaponry concentration there is so high that soldiers have described being stuck there for months on end. The movement required to rotate out is highly dangerous.
Drone surveillance is constant, and the enemy is so close that attacks come with little warning. It’s an area where soldiers can face both remote drone attacks and close combat with Russian soldiers, including small Russian infiltration groups that regularly approach, trying to find Ukrainian weaknesses. These challenges are tactically and psychologically daunting for troops in the field.
Even areas farther back from the zero line are extremely perilous, with attack and surveillance drones threatening troops and vehicles well behind the forwardmost positions. Ukrainian soldiers and officials describe the front as a “kill zone” that stretches up to 50 kilometers from the zero line on both sides.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy called it a “death zone” where any tank, armored vehicle, or motorcycle that enters it “burns.” He said that “everything is destroyed by drones.”
Vincenzo Circosta/Anadolu via Getty Images
Ukrainian troops have said that navigating this deadly area to reach front-line positions can be among the most dangerous parts of a mission. To reduce the chance that a single strike eliminates several people at once, some units have taken to spreading their soldiers farther apart while moving.
Yankee said it was “like Mission Impossible” just to get through this and get to the zero line in the first place.
Ukraine is increasingly trying to use drones and ground robots to conduct operations instead of sending soldiers into the most exposed areas.
But humans are still needed to operate weapons, prepare uncrewed systems, hold forward positions, and perform other tasks that Ukraine has not fully automated. For now, technology can reduce some of the risk at the front line, but it cannot remove soldiers from it.
