‘Like the movies’: How Ukraine’s ground robots are changing rules of war

Ternopil, Ukraine – A ground robot carrying ammunition and resembling a real-life cousin of Wall-E, the 2008 Pixar cartoon’s rusty protagonist, got stuck late one night in a trench in northeastern Ukraine.Named Murakha (ant in Ukrainian), the robot was a bit more than a metre high, but had a large clearance to trudge across rugged terrain, bombed-out streets, mud, sleet or snow on tank-like tracks at up to 12km (7.5 miles) per hour.Recommended Stories list of 4 itemslist 1 of 4Russian strikes near Ukrainian capital kill four, including childlist 2 of 4Woman screams in fear as Ukraine war recruiters pounce on manlist 3 of 4Russian forces kill several in Ukraine, launch ‘brutal’ attack in Odesalist 4 of 4Germany warns of ‘daily hybrid warfare’ after explosive-laden drone foundend of listIts pilots were hidden in a bunker tens of kilometres away from the stuck robot, slouched in chairs or pacing nervously next to a screen showing grainy, barely visible footage from Murakha’s camera.Sending a human rescue team to the front-line area was deemed too dangerous, an officer in charge of planning robotic missions said. Instead, the pilots managed to get another Murakha to pull the first one ...