Drone-Supported Assaults: A New Model for Combined Arms

Ukraine’s battlefield improvisation with drones has rewritten the playbook for modern warfare. Combined arms used to mean tanks and infantry. Now it means tablets, quadcopters, and a guy in a tree line with Starlink. If your squad can’t fly drones, jam drones, or kill drones, they’re just meat under glass.

U.S. Army photo by Operations Group, National Training Center

“Every soldier is now a drone operator or a drone target. There is no in-between.”
—AAR from Ukrainian 92nd Mechanized Brigade

Quadcopters buzz above tree lines. FPVs scream into bunkers. Drones drop grenades through hatches like coin-operated death dealers. Welcome to the new frontline. Drones aren’t just ISR platforms anymore—they’re shaping the tempo of combat, fusing recon and fires, and giving infantry and armor the eyes, brains, and punch needed to assault under contact in one of the deadliest ISR environments we’ve ever seen.

Ukraine has essentially written the manual on what modern drone-supported assaults look like. And the implications for U.S. and NATO forces? It’s time to rethink what “combined arms” even means.

Drones as Modern-Day Scouts

Old-school reconnaissance meant sending troops or scouts forward to observe and report. Risky, slow, and—against a peer—often fatal. Ukraine flipped that script.

FPV drones and quadcopters now hover at tree level, scanning trench lines, armor hides, and movement routes. Think of it as persistent reconnaissance-in-contact without needing to make contact.

Drones like the Leleka-100, PD-2, and Chinese DJI variants are fielded at platoon-level and below. Ukrainian squads have learned to never move without a drone overhead. These assets:

  • Clear trench systems before dismount
  • Spot enemy armor or infantry stacking for a counterattack
  • Pinpoint artillery positions for HIMARS or 155s
  • Stream real-time video to handhelds or tablets via Starlink

And we’re not talking Reapers or Gray Eagles here. We’re talking drones you can order online, print parts for in a barn, and fly with a few hours of practice.

Fire Coordination from the Sky

“Your scout is a quadcopter, your FO is a tablet, and your enemy is always watching.”
—NATO training officer after returning from Ukraine visit

Once a scout, now also your JTAC. Ukraine’s drone operators are simultaneously feeding target data to artillery, air defense, and loitering munitions operators. In the words of FM 3-09, this is “sensor-to-shooter” compression on steroids.

No more long chains of clearance. With a drone ID’ing targets and AI-enhanced fire control (yes, even on iPads), Ukrainian teams routinely call precision fires in under two minutes—sometimes under one.

Loitering munitions like the R18, Warmate, and UJ-22 act like pocket artillery, loitering near a kill zone until given a final terminal vector. The drone sees, guides, and often delivers the kill. This is the literal definition of “kill chain compression,” as discussed in FM 3-90-1 and ATP 2-33.4.

FPVs and Dropped Munitions: The New Casualty King

Forget IEDs. In Ukraine, the most casualty-producing systems today are:

  • First Person View (FPV) kamikaze drones
  • Dropped munitions from cheap quadcopters
  • Precision artillery enabled by drone ISR

Ukrainians and Russians both:

  • Drop VOG-17 grenades on dug-in troops
  • Fly FPVs into open vehicle hatches
  • Use drones to collapse bunkers
  • Hunt dismounted infantry between trench lines

This is contact under constant ISR. There’s no “safe” position.

“Even in the trench, you’re visible. If not to their eyes, to their thermals.”
—Ukrainian recon element, Bakhmut outskirts

Countermeasures being used:

  • DIY thermal cloaks and decoy soldiers
  • Squad-level jamming kits (see ATP 3-12.3: EW Techniques)
  • Movement under terrain masking and camo nets
  • Drone spotters overwatching friendly moves at all times

Russian and Ukrainian squads both suffer under a constant “loitering gaze.” Any movement in the open gets tagged and bagged—often within minutes. Every squad now lives under an aerial ISR bubble.

Ukrainians have adapted:

  • Moving in micro-teams under heavy concealment
  • Using “thermal cloaks” and decoys
  • Relying on drone overwatch before every bound
  • Deploying electronic warfare backpacks to jam incoming FPVs (ATP 3-12.3 covers this well)

The lesson for NATO? The sky is no longer a sanctuary. Any assault must now consider what’s overhead—and how fast it can kill you.

A New Combined Arms Paradigm

Here’s the kicker: these drone-enabled teams are effectively blending the traditional pillars of combined arms (maneuver, firepower, protection, intel) into single nodes.

A single Ukrainian assault team can:

  • Conduct ISR (with a drone)
  • Coordinate fires (with tablets)
  • Deliver precision strikes (with FPVs)
  • Conduct jamming or spoofing (with mobile EW kits)
  • Exploit effects (with trench assaults, breaching, etc.)

That’s not a combined arms team—that’s a combined arms node. This is mosaic warfare in action, as envisioned in the Army’s Multi-Domain Operations (MDO) concept and RAND’s future warfighting modelsMilitary Doctrine.

Implications for U.S. and NATO Forces

So what do we do about it? Here’s what needs to change:

  1. Drone integration at the squad/platoon level
    → ATP 3-21.8 and 3-21.10 must evolve to make organic drone employment and counter-drone tactics baseline skillsets—not niche.
  2. Autonomous and semi-autonomous fire coordination
    → Tablet-based fire requests (like Ukraine’s GIS Arta) must be adapted and encrypted for NATO use.
  3. EW and counter-FPV capabilities fielded to maneuver units
    → Not just brigade-level jammers—squad-portable jamming and spoofing tools need to be in every ruck.
  4. Training rotations at NTC/JRTC must reflect drone-saturated environments
    → Opposing force (OPFOR) units should use FPVs, ISR drones, and loitering munitions to simulate the layered threat environment.
  5. Invest in thermal deception, decoys, and rapid concealment tools
    → If you’re seen, you’re targeted. If you’re targeted, you’re probably dead.

If You’re Not Flying, You’re Dying

This isn’t optional adaptation. It’s survive or die. If your squad can’t fly drones, jam drones, or kill drones, then they’re meat under glass.

Ukraine didn’t just innovate; they evolved on contact. The drone revolution isn’t theoretical—it’s battlefield-proven, casualty-driven, and doctrine-altering.

Combined arms used to mean tanks, infantry, and artillery working together. Now it means drones are doing recon, guiding fires, spoofing sensors, and delivering precision death—all while your squad moves in to clean up.

U.S. and NATO forces must adapt now—or pay in blood later. Because the new rule of modern warfare is simple: control the skies below 400 feet, or someone else will.