Ukraine's Third Army Corps has begun using ground robots in frontline roles that previously fell to infantry, shifting tasks such as assaults, evacuations and resupply onto machines.
Commanders say the move responds to deadly battlefield conditions that make movement extraordinarily risky, alongside manpower limits that force new approaches to keeping soldiers alive.
A dedicated unit built around the machines
A specialised unit, NC13, is training with and operating the vehicles, part of the corps' Third Assault Brigade.
NC13 commander Mykola "Makar" Zinkevych said "every day of combat operations is, in essence, a daily renewal of warfare," describing the conflict as "the first and only modern, technological war in history."
Field workshops and units across the corps are adapting simple platforms for combat use, alongside more purpose-built systems.
What the robots are actually doing
Wheeled uncrewed ground vehicles, including so-called "Hyenas", are being repurposed to carry explosives and to assault enemy dugouts, according to frontline reporting.
One robotic complex, the DevDroid TW 12.7, held a defensive position for 45 consecutive days, using machine-gun fire to suppress repeated attempts by Russian forces to break through, without any personnel losses on the Ukrainian side.
The corps has also used a ground robot called the Zmiy to deliver explosives roughly a kilometre into Russian-held territory, destroying a river crossing in what officers described as the first such sabotage operation of its kind.
The scale of the shift
Since deploying to the Lyman-Borova front a year ago, the Third Army Corps has carried out more than 18,000 missions using ground robotic systems, evacuating over 600 wounded soldiers and transporting 4,500 tonnes of cargo.
Deputy Chief of Staff Danylo "Boroda" Novytskyi said the corps is "the first and so far the only corps to use ground robotic systems at this level," adding that "every second ground robot in the Armed Forces of Ukraine operates within" the corps.
Part of a wider technological shift
This shift layers onto a wider transformation in which aerial drones and data-driven tools are already central to Ukrainian tactics.
Commanders increasingly see ground robots as another way to preserve soldiers' lives while sustaining operations, even as the technology remains new enough that officers describe themselves as still learning its full potential on the battlefield.
