How Ukraine’s artillery backbone can withstand a new wave of Russian mobilisation

Let us talk about Ukrainian artillery. But let us begin with Russia's "elections." More precisely, let us begin with what may happen immediately after them.

Ukraine's public agenda increasingly features political forecasts about whether Russia will launch another mobilisation before or after the "elections," accompanied by analyses of the social and political risks this would create for Putin and his system. The aggressor state's leader may opt for open mobilization or a hidden draft. The official Russian terminology does not matter. Ukraine must actively prepare now for an influx of enemy manpower, targeting a new wave this autumn or winter.

I often hear overly optimistic claims about an impending financial collapse in Russia that is supposedly destined to cause the collapse of its army as well. However, even a significant slowdown in the Russian economy could have the opposite effect. In a totalitarian state, military contract payments may become virtually the only way for an impoverished population to earn a living.

Moreover, the Russian military has consistently demonstrated its willingness to trade the lives of its soldiers for Ukrainian territory on a vast scale. It does not necessarily need to prepare a single major mechanised breakthrough. Its working model may remain systematic pressure by small groups. This includes constantly saturating of the frontline, conducting reconnaissance in force, searching for gaps between the areas of responsibility of Ukrainian units, and increasing the number of small-scale local advances.

What is now called the "kill zone" is an area extending several dozen kilometres in front of our positions. It is under constant observation and fire. The enemy's objective is to identify temporal and spatial gaps within this perimeter and overload our system with a high volume of micro-targets. Every small group must be detected and assessed, its coordinates transmitted, and an available crew and appropriate means of engagement found. In this way, the enemy forces Ukraine to expend scarce resources and operators' attention on a multitude of targets. Since the value placed on human life within the Russian military is extremely low, there can be little doubt that the enemy will preserve and expand this tactic in the coming months.

A potential new wave of mobilisation in Russia is therefore, first and foremost, a challenge to the throughput capacity of Ukraine's strike system. Ukraine cannot and must not respond to Russia's mass with its own manpower. Our response must be technological. This technological advantage must apply not only to weapon systems, but also to the speed of decision-making and the ability to scale firepower.

That is why preparing for a possible increase in enemy forces cannot be reduced to expanding a single category of weapon. It requires an integrated operational framework in which reconnaissance, drones, artillery, communications, and logistics function as a unified system, with no element operating outside it.

In this context, the popular "drones or artillery" debate is flawed in its very premise. Drones have undoubtedly become one of the defining instruments of modern warfare. Before their widespread use, militaries had never possessed such an extensive body of reconnaissance data combined with the ability to adjust fire immediately and assess the outcomes of military decisions. Drones have also completely transformed the rules governing the precision destruction of individual targets.

Yet artillery continues to provide the scale and tempo of fire, particularly when engaging grouped targets and concentration areas simultaneously. Once fired, an artillery shell does not depend on a communications link and cannot be neutralised by electronic warfare in the way a drone can.

It is therefore the combination of these capabilities that produces a qualitatively new result. Drones significantly enhance artillery in terms of accuracy and speed. They make it possible to strike command posts, logistics, and supply lines in operational depth much more effectively. Artillery, in turn, converts reconnaissance data into scalable firepower. So, to use a metaphor: unmanned systems are the nervous system, but artillery is still the backbone.

In 2022, Ukraine already witnessed how a shortage of adequate artillery support could rapidly alter the balance of forces. According to an assessment by RUSI, after Ukraine's ammunition stocks were depleted, Russia had achieved a tenfold advantage in artillery fire by June.

This painful experience must be translated into industrial and logistical policy. Ukraine needs sustained long-term serial production of ammunition and the advance maintenance of echeloned stockpiles based on projected scenarios. We must understand that a shell stored in a warehouse hundreds of kilometres away is not, in practical terms, an available munition. It has value only when a battery can receive it within the combat cycle.

However, the strength of the artillery backbone is determined not only by the quantity of ammunition and the speed of its delivery. The distance that this ammunition allows us to control is equally important. If the enemy can conduct fire, mass forces, and maintain logistics close to the line of contact while remaining beyond the reach of our effective massed strikes, the mere availability of shells does not create the required advantage.

Ukraine therefore needs not only its own serial production of 155 mm ammunition, but also the consistent development of its range, accuracy, and stability. This is where the issue becomes one of engineering superiority.

For Ukraine's private defence industry, a range exceeding 30 kilometres is an important technological milestone. It marks the transition from merely manufacturing NATO-standard ammunition to developing a product designed for modern counter-battery warfare.

In less than a year, the Ukr Armo Tech team developed from scratch and codified a Ukrainian 155 mm artillery shell with a confirmed range exceeding 30 kilometres. Other manufacturers are working in the same direction because everyone understands that standard range is no longer sufficient.

We all recognise the scale of the challenges ahead. We are monitoring the evolving dynamics of the war and understand that 30-plus kilometres is far from the final destination. Our next practical development milestone is already 40-plus kilometres, followed eventually by 50-plus kilometres.

Such ranges will enable us to engage enemy artillery, concentration areas, logistics, and command posts pre-emptively. This will ultimately reduce the number of small assault groups reaching the kill zone and generating a constant stream of dispersed targets. Most importantly, it will reduce the risks faced by Ukrainian artillery crews and expand the possibilities for manoeuvring fire between different sectors of the front.

For non-specialists, the technological differences involved in creating shells whose ranges differ by even ten kilometres may not be obvious. However, expanding accurate flight range demands sophisticated engineering, imposing strict requirements on aerodynamics, propellant stability, and predictable dispersion patterns.

The era in which a shell was simply a piece of metal filled with explosives ended decades ago. A modern artillery shell should instead be understood as part of a digital operational framework in which reconnaissance, coordinates, calculations, firing, adjustment, and battle damage assessment all operate within a field of high-precision data.

For Ukraine, the development of such ammunition has significance extending far beyond the needs of any particular sector of the front. Today, all Ukrainian shell manufacturers are building an engineering school that effectively did not exist within Ukraine's 155 mm segment before 2022. This school is transforming unique battlefield experience into technology and serial production capabilities.

In the near future, these capabilities will be needed not only by Ukraine. The Russo-Ukrainian war has significantly depleted European stockpiles. Even if Europe does not enter into an open confrontation, it will still be compelled to replenish its arsenals and reconsider its capacity to sustain prolonged, high-intensity combat operations.

In this context, Ukraine can finally become not only a consumer of other countries' military technology, but also one of the architects of a new European security framework.

Russia will retain its ability to send tens of thousands of people into assaults and accept casualties that would be intolerable to any civilised country for a long time to come. Our response must be ready before new and reinforced enemy formations begin their advance.

We immediately require capabilities for scalable strike delivery against the adversary before they concentrate forces and attempt to intensify their offensive operations. Our planned transition by our manufacturers from a 30-plus range to 40-plus and eventually 50-plus kilometres, is not a race for a technological record. It is a strategic calculation that matters both for Ukraine and for the future European security system.

It would be naive to believe that Europe's war with Russia will be the last war of the coming decade. It would be equally naive to believe that the era of artillery has passed and that drones alone now hold the advantage. No technology will succeed in isolation. It can succeed only as part of an integrated system.

The ability to strike any target on enemy territory that contributes to suppressing our forces and capabilities still belongs to the good old artillery shell, or perhaps to what we should now call the "new and vicious" artillery shell. Ukraine is actively developing the production of precisely such shells while building an effective, modern, integrated strike complex.

Hennadii Khirhii, CEO of Ukr Armo Tech