This week on 60 Minutes, CBS News correspondent Holly Williams and producer Erin Lyall reported on the cutting-edge of drone warfare: an innovation-driven arms race between Ukraine and Russia to dominate the battlefield with unmanned vehicles on land, by sea, and in the air. 

“There are estimates that 80% of combat casualties on both sides are now caused by drones,” Williams told 60 Minutes Overtime. 

Williams reported that the front line has become an expansive hunting ground for drones since the war’s early days of trench warfare.

“It’s at least 10 miles wide, and if you’re anywhere in that ‘kill zone,’ then you are at risk of being hunted down and killed by a drone,” Williams said. 

Lyall and Williams spoke to Ukrainian drone manufacturers, American investors, a U.S. military captain, and the architect of Ukraine’s drone program, Oleksandr Kamyshin, to understand the latest advancements in drone technology in the war between Russia and Ukraine.

Vitali Kolesnichenko founded a drone company called Airlogix that makes high-tech aerial surveillance drones for the Ukrainian military. He said the pressure to stay ahead of their Russian opponents is intense. 

“Every month we need — even a couple weeks maybe, you know — we need to iterate because it’s a cat-mouse game,” he said. “Not, like, you know, one step ahead but, like, breakthrough, like, many, many steps ahead.”

“Many of our sources told us that the next big breakthrough that they expect to see on the battlefield is swarm technology,” Williams told 60 Minutes Overtime. 

U.S. Army Capt. Ronan Sefton works on the “Ukraine Lessons Learned Task Force,” which translates experience learned on the battlefields of Ukraine to the U.S. military.

“It’s debated often as to what [swarm technology] actually means. But it’s really just a lot of drones working together at one time. And you’re taking away a cognitive load from, say, a pilot. And one person might be able to control many drones,” Sefton told Williams.

“So it’s, like, drones working together, like a swarm of bees?” Williams asked.

“Exactly…. it is scary,” Sefton said. “It should concern us all.”

“Most of the people we spoke to in the making of this story are fascinated to see how artificial intelligence and drones are going to develop together,” Williams told Overtime. “They also see that there are ethical questions there.”

Two retired U.S. Marines who invest in Ukrainian drone technology, Lenore Karafa and William McNulty, told Williams that although current drone technology uses artificial intelligence to assist in targeting, the prospect of taking humans completely out of the decision-making process is “terrifying.” 

The business partners said AI drone warfare, with the advancement of swarm technology, could possibly head in that direction, and they would not support it. 

“Because you have robots making the decisions?” Williams asked. “Correct,” Karafa said. “There always needs to be a human in the loop,” McNulty said. 

McNulty described a potential technology with humans completely out of the loop as an example: “One of my fears of a really insidious weapon system would be a missile flying over Kiev… instead of dropping cluster munitions, spitting out FPV drones that are then going to hunt anything that moves. That’s kind of where we’re moving, to that type of scary scenario.”

In 2022, Oleksandr Kamyshin was the CEO of Ukraine’s railways, helping millions of his fellow Ukrainians evacuate during the Russian invasion. He then became President Volodymyr Zelensky’s designated architect for Ukraine’s drone program.

He said swarm technology would provide a major advantage to Ukraine: that it’s a “big thing” both Russia and Ukraine are working toward to get an edge in the war. 

Kamyshin told Williams that Ukraine is compliant with European Union recommendations on the use of autonomous lethal weapons systems. EU guidelines state that “humans must make the decisions with regard to the use of lethal force, exert control over the lethal weapons systems they use, and remain accountable for decisions over life and death.”

“Is there a point in the future when humans will be outside that process?” Williams asked Kamyshin. “I don’t know,” he said. 

“Whichever country starts effectively using swarms of drones is going to have a massive advantage?,” Williams asked. 

Kamyshin said: “In my belief, yes… both countries are close. None got there yet.”

“It sounds like the Cold War,” Holly Williams said. 

“No. It’s a hot war,” Kamyshin responded.

This video was produced by Will Croxton. It was edited by Nelson Ryland. Jane Greeley was the broadcast associate. Reporting by Holly Williams and Erin Lyall.

Additional video courtesy of the 13th Khartiia Operational Brigade, the Ukraine Patrol Police, Khyzhak Brigade, the Security Service of Ukraine via Storyful, Ivanov Alexander Borisovich,

Gorovyi Igor Anatolyovich, Suspilne, VORON Battalion 100th Mechanized Brigade, AFP, Getty Images, and the Ukrainian Armed Forces via Storyful.