On a front where everything seems to be decided by trenches, artillery and drones in the sky, there is another war that is moving silently, close to the water and far from the spotlight. The Dnieper River, turned into a natural border and lifeline, has been filled with small battles for islands and passes that can change the balance of an entire region.
And in that fight, Russia has just introduced a novelty explosive.
A river as a front. The war between Russia and Ukraine remains stuck in a balance of attrition, with Ukrainian defenses slowing progress and much of the attention focused on Donetsk, but beneath that noise there is another less visible and very strategic battle: the control of several islands in the Dnieper River.
Ukraine dominates these islands and the western shore, while Russia controls the eastern shore and tries to seize them to facilitate assaults across the river and, in perspective, sustain operations that once again put places like Kherson at risk. On that river board, where each crossing is a potential suicide, technology once again appears as the shortcut to gain margin without paying the human Price.
Sirius-82. The videos released by the Russian Army show a new unmanned surface vehicle, the Sirius-82, which begins to operate in the Dnieper with an approach that is much more pragmatic than sophisticated. From what we can see, it is compact, about two meters long, and is aimed at short-duration missions, probably with electric and battery propulsion, which fits with the river environment and with quick round-trip tasks.
It does not look like an advanced autonomous system, but rather an instrument of “useful warfare” built to work now, here and now, even if it is crude and limited.
A YaRM
Modular charging and FPV control. The design suggests modularity, with the ability to carry cargo on the deck and also inside the hull, making it a platform adaptable to different missions without redesigning the vehicle from scratch.
In one of the recordings it is clearly seen how YaRM is carrying two anchored river mines, weighing about 13 kilos each, placed on the deck and released using mechanical actuators that release them into the water. The control, furthermore, could not be more “old school”: an operator directs it with a joystick like those of FPV drones and monitors the camera on a laptop, a simple recipe that reduces costs and speeds up deployment, but that in real combat can be enough.
River mining: the trap. The first feature shown is the placement of YaRM mines in shallow waters, a Soviet resource intended for rivers and canals, usually anchored just below the surface to threaten light vessels. Russia would use them to attack Ukrainian resupply boats moving towards the islands, which is precisely the weak point of any forward control on a river: maintaining supplies and rotations under fire.
Ukraine, in turn, uses similar mines to stop or destroy Russian attempts at rapprochement, and the result is an environment in which the Dnieper ceases to be a natural barrier and becomes a dynamic minefield, where the risk is not on the horizon, but under the water.
Demining and sacrifices. The other side of Sirius-82 is that it can be used to clear mines, which is just as important in a river war where each step requires opening a safe corridor. A video shows it as a sacrificial platform, advancing until it detonates a Ukrainian mine to clear a passage before a manned boat enters, a brutally logical concept if lives are put before material.
In addition, a common Russian demining technique is mentioned using explosive charges with delayed fuses launched at intervals to detonate nearby mines, and the Sirius-82 could do that job without exposing a crew in the middle of a river with no cover. A type of solution that only requires repetition and the absence of remorse when losing the vehicle.
Kamikaze attacks and assault support. Beyond mining, the system could be used as a kamikaze drone against Ukrainian vessels, ramming them and detonating a charge on board to destroy both, taking advantage of its low profile and the discretion of electric propulsion.
A more “logistical” use is also suggested in support of assaults on the islands, carrying supplies or even evacuating wounded if it is adapted for larger loads, something that would fit with a positional combat where the islands function as small bridgeheads. All in all, the Sirius-82 does not seem like a superweapon, but rather a tool to win the daily battles on the front, where each box of ammunition and each water crossing decides more than a major offensive.
The pattern of war. What the appearance of Sirius-82 reveals is a trend that we have talked about before: Russia and Ukraine are driven by personnel shortages, casualties and a very long front to replace humans with machines in tasks where the risk is disproportionate.
And the interesting thing is that this replacement does not necessarily come with advanced autonomy and latest generation sensors, but with “primitive” but perfectly functional systems, built quickly and with a clear objective. The underlying message is that modern warfare does not always reward the most sophisticated, but rather what can be mass produced and deployed, what is sacrificed without hesitation and what solves a specific problem this week.
A river that is no longer geography. If you also want, Sirius-82 is a symptom of how the Dnieper is becoming a space of denial of access on a tactical scale, where mines, drones and remote control replace classic patrols. It is small, cheap and expendable, but that is precisely why it is dangerous: it allows the river to be planted and cleaned with less human risk, and it maintains constant pressure on the islands that Ukraine controls.
And the more these platforms become normalized, the more likely it is that river combat will evolve into a war of “micro-robots” deciding the terrain meter by meter, until crossing the nation’s largest river becomes less of a military maneuver and more of a technological lottery.
Image | Telegram
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