In Combat, Exoskeletons Made Artillerymen Faster, Less Fatigued

Ukrainian artillerymen have to carry 30 shells a day which weigh 50 kilograms - 100 pounds. Artillery brigades using exoskeletons found they reduced leg muscle load by 30%, making the troops faster and less prone to fatigue at operational tempo for longer periods of time. 

This, in turn, contributed to increased rates of fire and more accurate. Smart use of technology enhances performance and results for Ukraine again. JL

Wes O'Donnell reports:

At current tempo, Ukraine’s 147th Brigade artillery crews carry 30 shells per day: at 1,200 kilograms per soldier, per day. That’s a small car’s worth of explosives, manually humped to a howitzer by one man. Ukraine has deployed exoskeletons to try to fix that. It is a leg exoskeleton with hinged joints along the thighs and knees, weighing 2 kilograms. It buckles at the waist and legs, wraps behind the user’s back, and has two hip actuators. It has 10 intelligent operating modes, over a temperature range of minus10 to 60 degrees Celsius, reaches an assisted movement speed up to 20 km/h, and supports assisted walking for up to 17.5 kms. The AI mode adapts in real time to the load on the soldier’s legs and spine. “According to combat test results, troops become less fatigued, work faster, and maintain combat effectiveness longer.” An exoskeleton reducing leg muscle load 30% and cuts fatigue contributes to rate of fire, accuracy, and the ability to sustain operations at tempo.

I have this theory about my Army service; totally unscientific and based only on my experience: The constant physical stress I subjected my body to, for a solid decade (about 20 years old to 30 years old), put me in the best shape of my life through my 30s.

Running, rappelling, hiking with rucks, quick bursts of speed when it was time to shoot and move, swimming, and of course, the normal daily time dedicated to physical training (PT)… as if we needed it.

But when I hit 40, the butcher’s bill came due. Now my life is constant pain, and it feels like I can pull a back muscle simply by reaching for a Dr. Pepper.

And, by the way, I was in the “light” infantry! Imagine what those artillery guys go through… I watched artillery crews do things to their bodies that no physical therapist would ever sign off on.

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Me before my body started a guerilla campaign against me. Author’s collection.

Loading 155mm rounds all day is exactly as brutal as it sounds, each shell weighing roughly 50 kilograms, crews running 15 to 30 of them per shift, day after day, in conditions that make the CrossFit gym crowd look like they’re doing a mild warm-up.

It’s actually surprising to me that it’s 2026 and (what was) the most technologically advanced military on the planet still goes to war in cloth uniforms with no mechanical assistance.

Well, Ukraine, never one to let a good tech idea rot on the shelf, may claim the mantle as the new “most technologically advanced” military on the planet.

And they deserve it.

At current operational tempo, Ukraine’s 147th Brigade crews are carrying up to 30 shells per day: at approximately 1,200 kilograms of ammunition per soldier, per day.

That’s a small car’s worth of high explosives, manually humped to a howitzer by one man, while someone is trying very hard to kill you.

Now, Ukraine has just deployed exoskeletons to fix that on the Pokrovsk front, in live combat, this week.

Ukraine’s 7th Rapid Reaction Corps of the Air Assault Forces became the first unit in the country’s Defense Forces to deploy exoskeletons in real combat conditions, with test samples already in use at logistics and combat positions.

The unit receiving them is the 147th Separate Artillery Brigade, the same outfit running French CAESAR self-propelled howitzers and Ukrainian-made Bohdana-BG towed 155mm systems on one of the most contested sections of the front line.

I can’t embed Facebook video for some reason, but you can watch the Ukrainian exoskeleton at work HERE.

Pokrovsk has been under sustained Russian pressure for months. This isn’t a quiet corner of the war where you’d want to test new equipment. But that’s exactly the point.

The system is a leg exoskeleton designed as rigid arcs with hinged joints along the thighs and knees, built from aluminum alloy, weighing 2 kilograms.

It buckles at the waist and legs, wraps behind the user’s back, and features two hip actuators that serve as hinges.

The whole thing folds into a briefcase.

According to the Ukrainian captions in the video, it has 10 intelligent operating modes, operates over a temperature range of minus 10 to 60 degrees Celsius, reaches an assisted movement speed of up to 20 km/h, and supports assisted walking for up to 17.5 kilometers.

The AI mode adapts in real time to the load on the soldier’s legs and spine.

Colonel Vitalii Serdiuk, the 7th Corps’ deputy commander, said what the numbers already tell you: “According to test results, they become less fatigued, work faster, and maintain combat effectiveness for longer.”

Less fatigued. Faster. Combat-effective for longer.

On a front where Russia is grinding forward at 70 meters a day trying to outlast Ukrainian resolve.

Artillery is the dominant arm of this war. Russia fires somewhere between 10,000 and 20,000 rounds per day at Ukrainian positions.

Ukraine fires considerably fewer, the munitions shortage has been real and persistent, but every round matters at a rate that’s hard to overstate. The crews operating CAESAR howitzers and Bohdana systems are working at a pace that would have been considered extraordinary in any previous conflict.

Actually, for crews of the Ukrainian-made Bohdana-BG towed howitzer, shells must be lifted to a greater height without a dedicated loader, which means a human being is manually performing a full-body lift of a 50-kilogram round. Richard Simmons eat your heart out.

But seriously, cumulative physical degradation in artillery crews is a real operational problem that doesn’t show up in debriefs the same way vehicle losses do, but absolutely shows up in sustained combat effectiveness over weeks and months.

Not to mention the long-term wear and tear on these soldiers’ bodies post-war.

An exoskeleton that reduces leg muscle load by 30 percent and cuts fatigue meaningfully is a direct contribution to rate of fire, accuracy, and the unit’s ability to sustain operations at tempo.

“Caesar crews destroy the enemy even on approach, and every minute and every shot matter,” the brigade said.

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147th Separate Artillery Brigade — AFU

The Techno-Assault Concept

The corps frames the introduction of such technologies as part of developing “techno-air assault” capabilities; a concept focused on using state-of-the-art systems in air assault operations.

This is the same corps that trains soldiers to counter Russian FPV drone attacks using virtual reality headsets and a special dummy pump-action shotgun, which is either the most interesting training aid in any military inventory right now, or the most terrifying, depending on your perspective.

Ukraine thinks about war like this:

Where human bodies are the limiting factor, insert technology.

Where human attention is the bottleneck, use AI.

Where human endurance degrades under sustained combat, find a mechanical solution.

Ukraine doesn’t have Russia’s manpower pool. It’s been operating on that constraint since February 2022. The response has been to make each soldier more capable rather than simply adding more soldiers, which is both born of necessity and brilliant doctrine.

Where the US is on this

Since we’re talking about exoskeletons on a battlefield, it’s worth noting where America’s own programs stand, because the contrast is instructive.

The US Army’s SABER is a soft, wearable exosuit strapped to the back and around each leg, designed to reduce spinal strain. Lockheed Martin’s ONYX is a lower-body exoskeleton with knee actuators. Neither system is standard-issue for American forces. Both exist in the research and limited-testing phase after years of development.

DoD — Public domain. Probably still 20 years from fielding…

YEARS of development! The American tech pipeline is infuriating.

Ukraine’s 147th Artillery Brigade is running a 2-kilogram aluminum exoskeleton with AI-adaptive modes and a mobile app in a live combat zone this week.

I’m not saying Ukraine’s system is more advanced than what Lockheed or the Army’s research labs are building. I’m just saying Ukraine’s system is on the Pokrovsk front and the American systems aren’t.

That distinction between fielded and promising is the same one that keeps coming up in every technology comparison between this war and Western procurement timelines.

Ukraine skips the comfortable middle phases and goes straight to live testing under the worst possible conditions.

The cost of the Ukrainian exoskeleton, for context, amounts to several tens of thousands of hryvnias, which at current exchange rates is roughly a few hundred to a few thousand dollars per unit.

So, let me get this straight: Ukraine’s is faster, cheaper, and on the battlefield right now… Got it. Compared to the US where until very recently, the average US infantryman was still using an AR-style assault rifle from before Vietnam.

Since we’re talking about Ukrainian tech…

Ukraine has also received two Phantom MK-1 humanoid robots for battlefield evaluation, one of the first real-world tests of humanoid soldier technology anywhere.

The exoskeleton deployment and the humanoid robot evaluation are happening simultaneously, on the same front, driven by the same logic: the country that runs out of capable soldiers first… loses.

That logic should be familiar to us who have watched how Ukraine has approached every other technology gap in this war.

It couldn’t match Russia’s artillery. So it built drones.

It couldn’t replace its lost armor fast enough. So it developed cheap anti-armor systems and layered drone tactics.

It couldn’t sustain strike campaigns with scarce, permissioned ATACMS rounds. So it built the FP-5 Flamingo.

Every constraint has produced an innovation response, usually faster and cheaper than any Western procurement process would have allowed. The exoskeleton is the same pattern applied to the most fundamental resource in any army: the body of the soldier carrying the ammunition.

Colonel Serdiuk put it in terms any veteran can understand: every minute matters, every shot matters, and a soldier who’s less exhausted shoots better and sustains longer.

The technology doesn’t replace the artilleryman.

It keeps him functional for the entire shift instead of degrading through it.