Poor security – a bloody lesson of Russian troops on the battlefield in Ukraine

Poor security caused Russia to suffer a lot of damage on the battlefield. (Photo: QQ).

So far, the war in Ukraine has been going on for more than a hundred days. Experts on different sides have very different assessments of the performance of the Russian army on the battlefield. However, they do have one thing in common in their view of the Russian military, which is that the Russian military’s job of keeping the battlefield secret is really not done very well, if not very poorly.

The US military media said that using only open source intelligence to monitor and predict the actions of the Russian military, a specialized intelligence agency is needed to monitor and predict the actions of the Russian military. doing what?

Another opinion even said: “Russia, outside of the global open source intelligence revolution, launched an attack on Ukraine, completely unprepared to wage an information war in a military environment. newspaper of the 21st century”.

Of course, this statement is a bit overblown, but the gaps in the Russian military’s secrecy are obvious. This manifests itself in several respects.

Russia’s anti-satellite camouflage is said to be bad.

The first is that the work of camouflage against spy satellites is not well done by Russia. According to statistics, so far, the US and Western Europe have more than 200 civil remote sensing satellites, plus military satellites, they basically cover the entire earth. Regardless of day or night, they can provide continuous visibility into important areas.

During the day they use visible light and can use synthetic aperture radar at night. The effectiveness of satellite observations is undisputed. But the Russian army rarely implements camouflage measures when gathering and maneuvering.

Before the outbreak of war on February 24, the concentration of Russian troops on the Russian-Ukrainian border and the Belarus-Ukraine border were all captured by Western remote sensing satellites. The US has very accurately calculated the number of troops and weapons that Russia is about to enter the war and their final gathering point. This is a taboo against the use of military force of a country.

The radios used by the Russian military on the battlefield obtained by Ukraine (left) show that this is a civilian type that can be purchased online.

The second is poor radio communication security. Because of the lack of secure machines, the Russian military purchased a large number of civilian radios to equip the army on the front lines. These civilian radios are not designed for military use and many components, especially ICs, are either American products or use open communication protocols.

That is, American electronic reconnaissance aircraft and electronic reconnaissance satellites can intercept and analyze the content of calls in a very short period of time to obtain relevant intelligence.

Even if the high command of the Russian army is equipped with some secret communication equipment, by processing and analyzing the content of radio communications of the base units, it is also able to understand the combat intentions, plans and actions of the Russian army, campaigns and tactics.

Moreover, IC circuits are imported from the West in Russian secure communication equipment, whether there is any “backdoor” installed, it is impossible to know for sure?

The use of cell phones by Russian soldiers is also a source of secret leaks.

The third is poor control of the media. The first is the traditional media, Russia has very poor control over the activities of journalists and does not censor enough news content.

In mid-May, when a Russian reporter covered the war in the city of Severodonetsk, to show the powerful firepower of the Russian army, he filmed a scene of a 240mm heavy self-propelled mortar firing, even They even use drones to show the entire battlefield from the air.

By analyzing the terrain and features in the video, Ukrainian intelligence officers have pinpointed the location of the mortars deployed at the Zoriya Chemical Plant. After using drones to scout and confirm targets, the Ukrainian military launched a counterattack with artillery fire, which not only destroyed the Russian self-propelled mortar, but also caused the ammunition on the ground. The ammunition truck exploded, the scene was very tragic.

Another is not having control over social media. So far, Russia has not completely cut off the civilian communication network in Ukraine, whether civilians or Ukrainian soldiers, even Russian soldiers can still use their mobile phones normally. This brings a great potential danger to security work.

Ukrainians are free to film Russian military activities, post them on social media sites and even provide intelligence directly to the Ukrainian government.

In addition, mobile phones carried by Russian soldiers are also sources of radio signals, even when they are not used to make calls. As long as he is within the service range of a certain BTS station, the Ukrainian telecommunications agency can detect and intercept him.

The 240mm self-propelled mortar was exposed due to the way Russian reporters reported.

These situations have provided Western intelligence agencies with a wealth of information, making many so-called open source intelligence agencies feel like digging a mountain of gold.

To date, the Russian military has not seen any improvement in the issue of battlefield secrecy. If the Ukrainian army finds new tactics and tactics that can effectively deal with the Russian army’s steady and advance tactics, then the Russian military is likely to continue to suffer due to the problem of loopholes in the system. keep the battlefield secret.

These lessons of the Russian army all have to be paid with blood and blood, it is worth it for the militaries of all countries to draw lessons for themselves in the future, if there is a war.