The drone operator said

• Ukrainian soldiers tricked the Russians into attacking the wrong location by building fake bunkers.

• A drone operator told BI they made efforts to make it look real and even put garbage nearby.

• Drone operators are targets of the Russians, so they operate underground on the battlefield of scars.

Ukrainian soldiers made fake bunkers with branches, more to trick Russian drone operators into finding them. This is especially important for Ukrainian drone operators to be a high priority target.

Dimko Zhluktenko, a drone operator for Ukrainian unmanned systems forces, told Business Insider that it has become a standard operating procedure for soldiers to “do some fake positions.”

He said soldiers built fake locations on the tree lines, designing them so that everything looks “real”.

“You're going to leave some mark of human life there, some garbage or anything,” explains Zhluktenko. This makes it more likely that the Russian reconnaissance drone OPS will focus on fake positions.

This is a clear warning to Ukrainian soldiers when fake bunkers cause enemy fires. “That will be a signal that you'll get hell out of there as soon as possible,” Zhluktenko said.

Another Ukrainian drone operator who spoke with BI in anonymous condition said the fake bunker was something Ukrainian operators tried to do when they had enough personnel to achieve this.

Hiding in the eyes of the enemy

Ukrainian drone operators are a high priority target for the Russian army. Therefore, they often try to cover up Russian attack drones and their reconnaissance drones that provide target data for their soldiers and other weapons, but they cannot avoid the frontline. They must be close enough to fight, especially in situations where obstacles such as electronic warfare and complex operations are covered by the battlefield section.

The drone operator who requested anonymity said the distance the operator can hang from combat depends on the terrain, but operators usually have to 0.9 miles from the front line.

In many places, operators often hide underground. A U.S. veteran who is fighting for Ukraine told BI last year that when most, if not all, were operating in towns, buildings there were destroyed.

“Our urban environment is all rubble,” they said.

The veteran said the frontline could be so immovable that the position “has enough hits by artillery, drones, mortars and other types of regulations. It disperses slightly over time. Eventually, it reaches a point where it is not a defendable position.”

For Ukrainians, many of their positions were “cut and almost nothing” and became “impossible to defend”.

Zhluktenko, who once operated strike and reconnaissance drones, said operators like him often use underground canoes covered with trees and branches. They placed the computers and equipment needed to operate the drone here.

Then they try to find places where drone antennas can be placed and emitted without being discovered, making them “look like trees or something.”

Throughout Ukraine's war, both Russian and Ukrainian armies used bait, using bait and setting traps to deceive the enemy. These include cardboard weapons, inflatable tanks, fake ditches with bombs, and more. These strategies play a key role in protecting troops and military equipment.

Another Ukrainian drone operator said the operators tried to operate “constantly inside the bunker”, but they said that sometimes operators had to risk their doors, including putting the drone on the ground so that it could take off.

He said this could be very dangerous because if the operator is found, they immediately see Russian drones flying towards them. He explained that when Russia discovered Ukrainian drone operators or their drone stations, these people became “target first.”

He said when Russia attacks posts, it won't stop anything. “It didn't sacrifice anything,” he said, and its reaction could include Russia's devastating gliding bombs.

Russian invasion of Ukraine has been more used in the use of invasion of Ukraine than any other conflict in history, and the sky above the battlefield can be so full of drones that soldiers find themselves confused about which ones are theirs.

Both sides are competing to build more drones than others and to cross each other's drone and counter-drone measures.

Read original articles about business insiders