Ukraine is testing homemade remote-controlled buggies for the first time to keep troops supplied this winter

Ukraine has been developing an increasing number of uncrewed solutions for logistics missions.

Courtesy of Brave1 Ukraine is testing homemade remote-controlled buggies for battlefield logistics.

The vehicles are meant to keep troops supplied through winter conditions.

Kyiv is pushing more robots and autonomous systems to the front lines.

Ukraine is testing homemade, remotely controlled off-road buggies for the first time, Kyiv disclosed on Friday, as the country looks for reliable ways to supply troops this coming winter.

Brave1, the Ukrainian state-backed innovation platform, said it held closed trials for buggies developed by local manufacturers with a special unit under Ukraine's GUR military intelligence agency.

The testing aimed to validate whether the optionally manned vehicles could perform under battlefield conditions, with winter in mind.

"As winter approaches, Ukraine's military needs affordable, fast, and highly mobile vehicles that can operate both with a driver and remotely," Brave1 said in a statement.

Ground robots have become a vital component of Ukrainian logistics this year and are part of a broader effort by the military to replace soldiers with machinery in dangerous front-line missions, whenever and wherever possible.

Many of these robots, however, have "limitations," Brave1 said, characterizing them as slow and warning that they could struggle in the snow and mud of winter.

Ukraine has used off-road buggies in special operations missions.

They're fast and capable on rough terrain, though they lack external protection.

With a remotely-controlled buggy, though, that becomes less of a problem.

Courtesy of Brave1 Ukraine is now prioritizing the development of locally made buggies to fill that potential capability gap.