Ukrainian forces have many tools in their arsenal to make sure the warheads meet their appointed foreheads—or trucks, trains, ferries, forward bases, and air defenses. Of all these tools, Starlink is one of the most problematic for the Russians because it’s reliable and jam-resistant.
Still, it’s not jam-proof. The Russians have again begun deploying giant jammers, such as the Volna Kupol Garant, which can disrupt a satellite signal and protect an area of 20 square kilometers, Defense Ministry adviser Serhiy “Flash” Beskrestnov posted on 16 June.
There are two problems though. The first is that they cost $1.5 million per system, require massive amounts of power, and are giant, having to be dragged around on six trailers.
Which leads into the second: they’re being hunted and destroyed, as one was by the Security Service of Ukraine and the 422nd Separate Unmanned Systems Battalion Luftwaffe on 14 June.
In the 422nd’s video of the strike, a Ukrainian strike drone maintains a perfect, uninterrupted video feed as it flies into the cluster of six trailers, while an observation drone nearby records the explosion.
“The first case of suppression of Starlink by the enemy was recorded in 2024 in the Kharkiv direction,” Flash wrote. It was “quickly detected by the Ukrainian military and destroyed. Until 2026, there were no mass attempts to repeat its use.”
Even if it’s effective at disabling Starlink in an area, the Volna Kupol Garant and its ilk appear not to actually offer any kind of guarantee against Ukrainian attacks. Even when intact, they appear very expensive and cumbersome for the amount of coverage they provide. Also, while Starlink has been a massive lifeline for Ukraine, it’s just one of the tools at Kyiv’s disposal.
“New systems are already entering service whose capabilities the enemy is entirely unaware of,” the Azov Corps told Euromaidan Press on 13 June. “They have a substantially greater range and are equipped with next-generation communications systems.”
Why Starlink is hard to jam
Starlink makes it less likely that a UAV will lose signal to the operator and improves the odds of an uninterrupted live video feed to the pilot, who can be anywhere in the world and react in real time.
Starlink connections also run at much higher frequency ranges than most drones controlled from the ground. To jam a connection, an EW system should match the target frequency. The higher the frequency, the more complex the jamming solution has to be.
Most drones are controlled at single-digit gigahertz ranges. Starlink can operate between 11 and 20 GHz, Ukrainian engineers previously told Euromaidan Press—Flash put the range at 14-14.5 GHz.
Finally, Starlink points straight up at space, making these waves harder for ground-based EW and radar systems to interfere and detect them, respectively.
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How the jammer works and why it falls short
The Volna Kupol Garant works through a series of satellite antennas that point at passing satellites overhead, according to Flash.
“The system emits powerful interference from Earth to the satellite, so that the satellite does not hear signals from conventional terminals,” he wrote.
Since Starlink’s range is divided into eight channels spaced at specific bandwidths apart, the Russians “took eight satellite ‘dishes,’ directed them at the satellite, and each ‘dish’ transmits interference on that channel. That’s it. The satellite is ‘deaf.’”
If the system can only jam one overhead Starlink satellite at a time, that could mean its utility is limited, as SpaceX has 10,000 satellites in orbit. Drones in flight can “jump” between them, as the Russians showed when they used to mount Starlink terminals on Shahed attack drones before Ukraine and SpaceX booted them off the service in February.
And even if it does work, Ukrainian forces have shown that it presents a very juicy target that costs a lot of money to the Russian military.
"The gentlemen from Russian Dome (the company that makes this system) managed to sell these products to the army for $1.5 million apiece," Flash wrote. "This is simply a fairytale."
