Ukraine’s New Robot Is An FPV Drone Carrier

Tracked robots known as Uncrewed Ground Vehicles (UGVs) are increasingly common in Ukraine; Ukraine plans to make tens of thousands this year. A new type is now emerging: the FPV carrier, as seen with the launch of a new vehicle known as Karakurt (“Black Widow”).

Flying a drone this way is simple enough, but has profound implications: it could be the start of a shift from crewed vehicles armed with guns to uncrewed drone carriers.

Little Boar To Black Widow

Makers IRV unveiled the Black Widow last week at the Iron Demo event near Lviv. It is based on an existing UGV, the Vepryk (“Little boar”). UGVs are typically designed to be modular so they can be easily adapted to different payloads and missions. Typically these include cargo carrying, casualty evacuation, mine laying, one-way attacks with explosive warheads, and direct combat using machine-gun turrets. Modification of UGV to drone carrier should not be too challenging.

The Black Widow vehicle can be controlled out to a distance of 4 kilometers / 2.5 miles – range is typically short for ground robots due to terrain masking.

The Black Widow carries six FPVs on two launch rails. The operator controls them via a repeater in the Black Widow, or with a relay drone launched by the Black Widow to extend range. The makers say they can hit targets 30 kilometers / 18 miles away with the airborne relay.

The Black Widow can wait at a particular location until needed, and be activated when targets are detected. An unusual feature is that the operator can launch and control two drones together, so that the second can observe the impact of the first and carry out a follow-up attack if needed.

A complete Black Widow system consists of a ground control unit, two Vepryk UGVs and twelve FPV drones, and costs under $50k. That’s about a quarter as much as a single Javelin missile: low-cost off-the-shelf tech is the key to building this type of expendable system.

Carrier Wars

There have been plenty of crewed drone carrier vehicles, from the impressive Chinese barrage drone launcher unleashing 48 attack drones to U.S. Army GBAD vehicles with Coyote interceptor drones and their more advanced Hive for launching and recovering swarms. But small systems are something else.

This war has shown the advantage of getting attack drones as close to the target as possible before launch. For the Russians, this has meant assault troopers carrying FPVs forward with them so that operators further back can activate them when they are close to Ukrainian trenches. Ukrainian are more likely to use ambush tactics, landing an FPV close to a track used by Russians and waiting for a target before attacking from a few yards away.

The Russians have also seen the advantage of robots as FPV carrier and a similar concept has appeared on their side. At the Archipelago 2025 defence expo this week, Russian makers Hermes showed off their Argus FPV carrier. Again this is a standard UGV fitted out to transport, control and launch multiple drones.

Again, the makers note that their system can be pre-positioned for an ambush “many days” in advance. Like Black Widow, Argos can launch reconnaissance and communication relay drones as well as FPVs. The entire system is controlled by one operator.

Hermes stress that their technology is in the remote launch and control of drones, and the platform is irrelevant to them. They can deploy it on a UGV, aerial drone or drone boat. However, this suggests that this is a technology demonstrator and they do not yet have an operational system to sell.

Another Russian development, unveiled on August 8^th, uses fiber optics. The Dronobus made by Scientific and Technical Center Kornei is a UGV controlled via a fiber-optic link which acts as a carrier for a single FPV which are also controlled via fiber. The UGV can be controlled from 10 kilometers/ 6 miles away and the drone adds another 15 kilometers / 9 miles.

Again this looks like an early prototype or technology demonstrator, but it does show how fiber can be incorporated into carriers. This makes the UGV itself impossible to detected by its radio emissions, and the fiber drone is immune to jamming and electronic warfare.

Carriers Replacing Battleships Again?

For a while, heavy tanks ruled the battlefield and trumped all other combat vehicles. With their combination of a powerful high-velocity gun and thick armor, the only thing that could challenge a tank was another tank. And while they needed the support of infantry and artillery in combined arms operations to be effective, even anti-tank guided missiles did not dent the supremacy of the tank for decades.

However, the advent of small, numerous drones with can strike far beyond the range of a tank gun seems to have knocked the tank off its top spot. Tanks are now kept well back because, even when piled high with additional armor and jamming equipment they are easily spotted and destroyed.

The battleship used to rule the seas thanks to big guns and thick armor, was displaced by the aircraft carrier. In WWII it was displaced by the aircraft carrier, The carrier could not match the battleship’s ability to fire a broadside of metal at high velocity, but long-range strikes by small dive and torpedo bombers meant that even the mighty Yamato, the world’ most powerful battleship. was doomed to be destroyed before it could close with the U.S. fleet.

But as far back as the 1921 airpower pioneer Brigadier Billy Mitchell argued that aircraft would change sea warfare – and had his aircraft sink a battleship in a demonstration to prove it. Admirals pointed out that aircraft had short range and could only cover coastal areas, but the carrier changed that.

Drone carriers are likely to evolve rapidly. There may be larger or smaller versions, crewed or uncrewed, wheeled, tracked or even legged, carrying just one or two drones or hundreds, and they will be competing with flying FPV carriers. Black Widow is likely to be the first of a long series of such carriers into a future when the only tanks are in museums.