Thread by @sambendett

1/ QUICK THREAD on the Ukrainian claims that the country manufactures 50,000 FPVs per month, while Russia potentially manufactures up to 300K FPVs monthly. The claim comes from this article and quotes Maksym Sheremet, the founder of the DroneSpace company. forbes.ua/innovations/uk…

2/ The 50K Ukrainian number quoted is within the estimates of what the combined Ukrainian FPV effort is - likely tens of thousands but probably less than 50K - and where Ukrainian military's needs to be - hundreds of thousands manufactured monthly.

3/ Probably the biggest argument against such large FPV numbers quoted in the article (50k vs 300K) is that there would have been way more video and other evidence of such a massive FPV use by both sides. In reality, each side likely employs thousands of FPVs but not...

4/ ...tens of thousand s since that would have resulted in significant tactical changes on the front. Its likely that Ukraine does have a large number of FPVs - previous estimates put Ukr. monthly drone losses at up to 10K per month - but the 50K sounds more aspirational...

5/...than practical, even if large FPV numbers are used and lost to the Russian EW/CUAS defenses. On the Russian side, the 300K per month sounds way too high - in August, I made this thread that disputed earlier Ukrainian estimates...

https://twitter.com/sambendett/status/1689295818623188995

6/...that the combined Russian monthly effort results in up to 40,000 manufactured - back then the realistic figure was more around 15,000 FPV per month. Since then, there as a major increase in the Russian FPV assembly activity...

https://twitter.com/sambendett/status/1654836992704741378

7/...that I try to record in the thread above. The claimed 300K per month is a significantly higher number than what these combined Russian efforts can deliver today. Still, the Russian FPV assembly activity is growing from month to month, though probably not at a pace...

8/...claimed by Sheremet. The Russian mil bloggers are still calling for the country's defense-industrial enterprises to get more involved in mass-scale FPV delivery that may start in 2024 - so the real Russian numbers "may" be up to 50K but probably not more than that yet.

9/ Finally, another argument against such massive uses is the actual number of FPV pilots at the front. Ukraine claimed to have trained many hundreds of FPV pilots already, and both sides are contently offering FPV pilot courses to willing volunteers. But both sides...

10/...are also going after each others pilots, so the FPV pilot losses must be taken into account. This goes back to my earlier point about the potential tactical impact "if" such larger drone numbers where indeed used. Its likely that both sides will significantly ramp up...

11/...both FPV/drone manufacturing next year along with the EW/CUAS systems to mitigate this threat. Eventually, we "may" arrive at the FPV numbers claimed in the article, but probably not at this moment in the war. But the Ukrainian article offered other interesting details.

12/ For example, the article clams that "with one (Ukrainian) engineer assembling about 50 FPV drones, the industry consists of approximately 1,000 people. Production of FPV drones is relatively easy to scale - they are assembled from Chinese components."

13/ "However, we lack people who know how to assemble everything by hand. (Ukrainian) FPV drone manufacturers lack 2,000 engineers, estimated by the president of the... Ukraine drone manufacturers association."

14/ "To scale six times, you need six times as many engineers, Sheremet believes. That is, the Ukrainian industry should consist of 6,000 engineers." Another interesting point is that "there are about 200 manufacturers of drones of various types in Ukraine."

15/ "They (200 manufacturers) provide only 10-15% of the total needs of the army, says Lyubov Shipovych, the founder of the Dignitas Foundation. According to her estimate, FPV drones needs alone are about 200,000 units per month." This number was also echoed earlier...

16/...by other Ukrainian volunteers who estimate Ukrainian military drone needs to be in the hundreds of thousands per month. Russian mil bloggers likewise stated earlier they need such massive FPV amounts as well.