Training for the new threat from above
Military drones are changing the way wars are fought, shortening the kill chain and putting enemy eyes deep into previously protected territory. To stay alive, soldiers need to know how to identify – and react to – the new aerial threat. Saab’s designated live UAV training capability is designed to help.
Imagine that you’re a ground combat troop deployed close to the battlefront in a future conflict. As you and your unit carefully advance, you suddenly hear the distinctive bee-like buzz of a rotary-winged drone approaching. You crane your head and while you can’t make out the drone, the buzzing indicates it’s now right above you. What do you do next?
If you don’t immediately know how to respond, you’re not alone. While soldiers have been contending with shells, bullets and savage enemies for centuries, it’s only in recent times that their lives have been threatened by platforms as agile, fast and hard to spot as small UAVs. Even 15 years ago, the designation ‘UAV’ was used almost exclusively to describe sophisticated fixed-wing aircraft, typically worth many millions of dollars and operated by highly trained remote pilots. However, the world and the battlefield have changed.
As recent conflicts are clearly demonstrating, small rotary-wing drones are playing an increasingly decisive role in modern warfare. Able to be purchased in mass from civilian manufacturers, such UAVs are extremely hard to detect with conventional radar and, by flying low, they can often avoid fixed defence systems. This enables surveillance drones to penetrate deep into protected territory, identifying embedded troops and providing the enemy with precise coordinates for artillery strikes. Weaponised drones, meanwhile, are able to dramatically shorten the kill-chain by not only identifying enemy targets, but also dropping munitions on them.
Anyone following the Ukraine conflict will have seen UAV video feeds showing soldiers panicking as hand grenades and other small munitions are dropped from above with devastating effect. Figures emerging from the war suggest that UAVs have played a key role in a majority of the casualties suffered by both sides. Meanwhile, slightly larger rotary wing UAVS are playing an important role in logistics, helping to ferry supplies and weapons to troops, even taking the wounded to safety.
Train against drones again and again
With drones now determining the outcome not only of battles but potentially wars, it’s critical that troops know how to react when they encounter them. National armed forces also need to develop protocols and doctrines that set clear guidelines for responding in a uniform way. Saab understands this and since 2023 we have been offering drone simulation as part of our live training offering. Customers can use the service to create and test guidelines for managing drone interactions. Early-adopter customers include the British Armed Forces.
In a typical scenario, one or more drones piloted by Saab operators are introduced to an outdoors live training exercise where our GAMER live training solution is in use. As troops engage with the enemy and attempt to execute their battle strategies, they must also decide what action to take when a single or multiple drones arrive on the scene. While the specific actions may vary from nation to nation, the interaction with the drones significantly enhances the real feeling of the battle situation. This means when a drone inevitably arrives in a real combat situation that troops will be prepared.
Depending on the customer’s needs, the training drones used can simulate various mission objectives. With weaponised drones dropping munitions proving a major threat in Ukraine, the training drones can, for example, drop virtual munitions. Our laser-based live training solution can be used to track and record which soldiers are ‘killed’ by these munitions, with the casualties notified they have been hit via lights and audio cues on their training vests. At the same time, trainees are also able to defeat the drone from the sky using weapons with simulated munitions with realistic ballistic profiles. If the drone is hit, LED lights on its surface change colour and the pilot removes it from the location.
Range of training scenarios
Because drones don’t always act in isolation, the simulation can also be expanded to include multiple UAVs flying in swarms or attacking simultaneously at different locations across the training environment. And because not all drones on the battlefield are necessarily weaponised, the simulation can be adapted to represent surveillance drones and logistics drones. Saab can adapt the system to work with any of the drone types and models preferred by our customers. Once the exercise is over, training data can be analysed to develop insights on which troops performed best when interacting with the drones and how overall performance can be improved. Because drone strategies are still being developed by many nations, this data can help form the basis of their wider doctrines and chain of command guidelines. Troops can also be taught that not every drone they see above them is a threat. In cases where the drone above is friendly, they may be able to task it to perform forward reconnaissance and report back on the enemy’s position.
With the designated designated live UAV training capability soldiers will be able to train on how to identify and react to military drones.
A key benefit of the training is to sensitise troops to the presence of drones and teaching them to not panic. As the footage from recent conflicts has shown, untrained soldiers often stand frozen like deer in the headlights when confronted by the sound or sight of a small UAV. Some plead for mercy. With proper training, they will know how to identify the origins and purpose of an unknown drone and automatically follow the appropriate protocol for dealing with it. This also reduces the risk of friendly drones being destroyed by indiscriminate firing.