Robert Brovdi, Ukraine drone commander: Striking inside Russia

0:00Robert Brovdi:This BBC podcast is supported by ads outside the UK.

0:30Sarah Rainsford:We do the things we do and how to make better choices to help avoid costly mistakes. Each episode covers the latest research in behavioral science and dives into themes like the power of self-control, shaping your mindset for success, navigating new beginnings and why starting over can feel so hard. Listen to choiceology at schwab.com slash podcast or wherever you listen. Is China the real winner from the war in Iran? I'm Asma Khalid, one of the hosts of the Global Story podcast from the BBC. As the war in Iran drags on, one big idea we keep hearing is that somehow the real winner is a country technically not even involved in the fight, China.

1:15Sarah Rainsford:But is that story actually true? And what does this war mean for China's long-term ambitions? Listen to The Global Story on BBC.com or wherever you listen to your favourite pods. Hello, I'm Sarah Rainsford, the BBC's Southern and Eastern Europe correspondent. And this is the interview from the BBC World Service. The best conversations coming out of the BBC. People shaping our world from all over the world.

1:45Robert Brovdi:If you're not a little bit afraid, then you're not paying attention.

1:49Sarah Rainsford:We have never seen a people so united. Do not make that boat crossing. Do not make that journey. Being born in America, feeling American, but having people treat me like I'm not. We're more popular than populism. For this interview, I travelled to a secret command centre in eastern Ukraine for a rare interview with Robert Brovdy. He's the head of Ukraine's unmanned systems forces, all its drone units. More than four years into Russia's full-scale invasion, drones have become central to how this war is being fought. They're now used not only on the front line inside Ukraine, but to strike targets deep inside Russia itself, including energy infrastructure and military sites.

2:33Sarah Rainsford:That wasn't always the case. Robert Brovdy first used drones to spot Russian positions and then direct strikes on them using artillery units. But soon, all that changed.

2:46Robert Brovdi:I will tell you when it truly transformed. When we only had reconnaissance drones, we learned fast. But reconnaissance drones did not allow us to destroy the enemy directly. We had to rely on artillery. Then we began attaching certain warheads to the drones. At first, these were grenades, then homemade munitions that we produced ourselves. We would locate the enemy with the drone and drop them on him. Then in June, FPV drones entered our lives. An FPV drone is a one-way disposable drone. It is cheaper than a reconnaissance drone and can carry a heavier munition. That was the moment the turning point began.

3:31Robert Brovdi:We built first FPV drones ourselves, buying components, fastening them together, making homemade munitions. That was when the way of war began to change, from a war imposed by the enemy, where you simply wait and hope you don't die in your position, to when the drone appeared and you could influence the situation.

3:55Sarah Rainsford:Welcome to the interview from the BBC World Service with Commander Robert Brovdi. And a warning, this interview contains some descriptions of death and violence.

4:09Robert Brovdi:When we went to war, we followed the call of our hearts. We did not know what awaited us. Putin promised to take Kiev in three days, so we gathered in the territorial defense. They gave us rifles without defined tasks, only to defend what we had around us. For those first three months, the enemy was imposing its kind of war on us. We could not find a way to respond effectively. Our unit consisted almost entirely of civilians. Some were entrepreneurs and we transferred our organizational skills directly into the military environment. When we arrived in the south, the enemy had captured Herson and was pushing towards Mykolaiv.

4:51Robert Brovdi:We as infantrymen found ourselves in trenches. Something was killing us, we were taking losses, but we could not respond. This was when the first thought of a drone appeared. to put it up in the air and see what was on the other side. When we launched the drones, we saw that they were dug in behind the canals, covered with concrete slabs. Their tank would come out, like from a garage, fire and hide again. The drone allowed us to see it, but we had no weapons to destroy what we saw. So we turned to neighboring brigades that had artillery. which transmitted a live feed from the drone and began adjusting their fire and the nearby units started conducting accurate strikes.

5:38Sarah Rainsford:Am I right in thinking that these drones were just really basic drones and that one of them was your son's drone at the beginning?

5:47Robert Brovdi:The first time I bought a drone, it was for my kids when I was on a business trip in Singapore. So my kids were playing with one, and somehow I remembered in my head that even a kid can fly such a device a couple of hundreds of metres up and see what you cannot see from the ground. It was an association that came up at that moment. This idea first developed as self-preservation.

6:16Sarah Rainsford:It completely changed the battlefield. It changed the way this war was being fought. As drones came into this war, that completely transformed.

6:25Robert Brovdi:I will tell you when it truly transformed. When we only had reconnaissance drones, we learned fast. But reconnaissance drones did not allow us to destroy the enemy directly. We had to rely on artillery. Then we began attaching certain warheads to the drones. At first, these were grenades, then homemade munitions that we produced ourselves. We would locate the enemy with the drone and drop them on him. Then in June, FPV drones entered our lives. An FPV drone is a one-way disposable drone. It is cheaper than a reconnaissance drone and can carry a heavier munition. That was the moment the turning point began.

7:09Robert Brovdi:We built first FPV drones ourselves, buying components, fastening them together, making homemade munitions. That was when the way of war began to change, from a war imposed by the enemy, where you simply wait and hope you don't die in your position, to when the drone appeared and you could influence the situation. You were no longer being led. You were leading. You set the tone. You could affect the enemy's plans.

7:38Sarah Rainsford:From that moment that you're describing, from that time to now, the transformation has been enormous and drones play a massively important role in this war. How would you describe the importance of your unmanned systems forces right now at this point in the war? How would you describe your role and your significance now?

8:01Robert Brovdi:Our most valuable asset is our soldiers. Mobilization in Ukraine in the fifth year of war is, to put it mildly, difficult. Those who wanted to fight are already fighting. Those who wanted to leave have already left. Recruitment continues constantly, but not at the speed we need. The main priority of deterrence is to have a direct impact on enemy personnel. I'll translate that into simple Ukrainian. Killing their manpower. Doing this with your own manpower is very dangerous because replacements are slow. But trading enemy soldiers for a plastic and metal drone that costs$300 to$500 is the best exchange rate in the world.

8:47Robert Brovdi:We trade a drone worth a few hundred dollars for the life of a Russian assault soldier.

8:52Sarah Rainsford:Are you increasing the numbers because you're focusing so much on that target, on that goal, or because you're doing something different technically? First, it is the priority.

9:05Robert Brovdi:First, it is the system of priorities. The first priority is the destruction of enemy drone pilots who inflict heavy losses on the personnel of our Ukrainian defense forces to knock out logistics, disrupt defensive actions, violate positions and so on. And the second priority is their manpower. We have a plan for that. 30 % of all drone strikes by unmanned system forces must be against military personnel.

9:33Sarah Rainsford:There's like a kill plan, basically, for Russians.

9:36Robert Brovdi:Yes, you can call it a kill plan. Right now, we are exceeding the plan. We are at about 34%, in fact.

9:44Sarah Rainsford:The decision is to kill more soldiers than Russia can mobilize. When the soldiers are already no threat and they're on their own, isolated, hiding behind a bush, is there no thought of taking them prisoner instead? Because I know there's also orders to take as many prisoners to have like a fund for exchange, for example. I mean, is it normal just to kill if a soldier's on their own in a bush somewhere?

10:11Robert Brovdi:Let's not touch on the norms of international law here, or have any doubts. The enemy came to our land. He is far outside his country. We don't go after the injured, and where possible, we take all the prisoners we can in order to exchange for our own lads. But not for a moment should we be ignored by doubt or any pity for the enemy, because if we don't kill him, he will kill us. That is clear. We didn't invite him here. A person who is coming towards us with a weapon in his hands is hardly a gardener or a traveler. This is an enemy that has come hundreds of kilometers outside his territory, intending to go as far as possible and raise the three-color Russian flag.

10:56Robert Brovdi:I don't even know what is more important to Putin, to take more land when he already has land all the way to Vladivostok and up to China, or simply to destroy us as a nation. It seems to me that destroying us as an independent nation is his main priority, but that is not acceptable to us. The number of soldiers' burials in Russia leads to certain social shifts, because even under the censorship that exists in Russia, with restrictions on social media and the absence of alternative views, people are clearly asking each other the question, what is this special military operation for? And this begins to stir and create a certain ferment in society.

11:46Sarah Rainsford:You're listening to the interview from the BBC World Service with me, Sarah Rainsford.

12:16Sarah Rainsford:and everyday people about why we do the things we do and how to make better choices to help avoid costly mistakes. Each episode covers the latest research in behavioral science and dives into themes like the power of self-control, shaping your mindset for success, navigating new beginnings, and why starting over can feel so hard. Listen to choiceology at schwab.com slash podcast or wherever you listen. Is China the real winner from the war in Iran? I'm Asma Khalid, one of the hosts of the Global Story podcast from the BBC. As the war in Iran drags on, one big idea we keep hearing is that somehow the real winner is a country technically not even involved in the fight, China.

13:03Sarah Rainsford:But is that story actually true? And what does this war mean for China's long-term ambitions? Listen to The Global Story on BBC.com or wherever you listen to your favorite pods. It wasn't easy to meet Commander Brovdy. He doesn't speak to journalists very often. But we managed to secure this interview at a time when Ukrainian drones were making real headlines by striking deep inside Russian territory. They'd been hitting oil facilities in particular. But getting to him wasn't easy either. His location's top secret. He's a prime target for Russian forces. So we met some contacts in a location in eastern Ukraine, and they drove us in a van with blacked out windows.

13:49Sarah Rainsford:I think at one point we went over some fields and then eventually we had to go down several flights of stairs to emerge into this high tech cavern, the command center underground. There were lots of soldiers there hunched over keyboards and joysticks. There were screens on every wall from floor to ceiling and lots of sounds. There were the beeps and the alerts from incoming data from the battlefield. All those screens covered in live feeds from drone units on the battlefield. Now, the commander himself is ethnically Hungarian. He's from the far west of Ukraine. And actually in Ukraine, he's best known by his callsign, Madja.

14:29Sarah Rainsford:He's got quite a backstory. He used to be a grain dealer. He was pretty wealthy before the war and he was very big in promoting Ukrainian art. So he was often seen at auction houses like Sotheby's or Christie's in London, which is, of course, a massive world away from where we met him. He was pretty softly spoken to and all of that really made some of what he had to say to me, quite chilling. The way he talked about the kill rate for Russian soldiers in particular, how they were just numbers for him and his total apparent lack of pity for the other side. I asked him about that directly. And remember, this is a man who spent a long time in the infantry, in the trenches, fighting in some of the most brutal battles of this war.

15:13Sarah Rainsford:And the way he sees it out there, it is kill or be killed. He's seen the ruthlessness of the Russian forces in Butcher and in Bakhmut, and he has no illusions at all. When I pushed him, he did say his forces would take prisoners if they could, but he was very clear that Ukraine needed to reduce the number of soldiers that Russia can fight with. For Commander Brovdy, I think the goal is just to use his drones, to use the technology to defend Ukrainian land as best he can. Okay, let's return to my conversation with Commander Robert Brovdy. I want to ask you about the deep strikes. I want to ask you about what you've been doing in terms of hitting targets further and further inside Russia.

15:56Sarah Rainsford:I think you've set up a new deep strike center as well for that. So there seems to be this new focus on deep strikes in Russia. Can you tell me why? What's the aim? What's the thinking?

16:06Robert Brovdi:It's simple. The destruction of the military-industrial complex, infrastructure, military facilities and logistics. The destruction of the source of financing for the war.

16:19Sarah Rainsford:Which includes oil, which includes energy.

16:23Robert Brovdi:Putin extracts natural resources and converts them into bloody dollars. They exchange the natural resources of their land for dollars, which they later direct against us.

16:37Sarah Rainsford:So you're specifically targeting, focusing on particularly the oil export potential of Russia?

16:43Robert Brovdi:To achieve an economic effect, the key target is the extraction of petroleum products, crude oil and their export. That's the quickest route for them to make money. Second, there is their military-industrial complex. They produce a great deal of toxic weaponry, which they use against us in this war.

17:04Sarah Rainsford:If we talk about specifically the oil exports or the energy exports, how successful do you think you've been in your strikes recently, the last couple of months, focusing specifically on the energy sector?

17:19Robert Brovdi:Look, the economic assessment is done by economic analysts. But you cannot shut an oil well on Thursday and reopen it on Friday. It can either be sealed or operating. The accumulation of these petroleum products requires storage facilities. When those are constantly on fire, it limits their capacity and prevents exports. These are very substantial sums of money that could be used to finance the war. Deep strikes must be carried out and will continue to be carried out non-stop against a wide range of targets, all of them united by one definition, legitimate military targets. If all refineries are a tool to convert resources into money that will later be used for war, then these are a lawful military target which are subject to destruction.