Fast-attack motorcycle units
Looking at this I wonder whether that front rider will ever hear again?
Hah! Y’all are thinking I am losing my marbles ‘cuz I already wrote how the Rooshians were using these against the Ukrainians a while back.
Well… there is some justification for that thought – just ask my wife – but this case is a little different.
Quite a few derided the two-wheeler units as easy to kill, ineffective, etc… well, apparently one group is impressed enough to field their own – their opponent, the Ukrainians.
As the battle with drones continues, motorcycles have become a rising star in Ukraine’s war.
The Ukrainian military’s 425th separate assault regiment, nicknamed “Skala,” announced on Tuesday that it had officially formed the country’s first motorcycle attack company.
“As a result, we now have a modern ‘cavalry’ whose main task is to rapidly break through to enemy positions, conduct assault operations, and quickly shift the direction of attack,” it said on its Telegram channel.
Telegram…wonder if they returned the favor and copied Pete Hegseth… nah, can’t say that, it’d be a low blow. And too easy.
While motorbikes leave the rider more exposed, they’re faster, nimbler, and smaller, which makes them better able to evade attacks from small drones.
As an infantry buddy once mentioned to me “yeah, in a tank you feel invulnerable – riding in the biggest highest priority target on the battlefield.”
The use of motorcycles to carry troops into battle is well-documented in Ukraine. Since early last year, Russian troops have been increasingly seen riding on light vehicles such as ATVs and motorbikes as both a means of transport and a way to attack Ukrainian positions rapidly. In its statement, the 425th said its motorbike-riding troops had trained for “hundreds of hours” to shoot while on the move. The statement did not indicate whether the unit has started fighting or when its motorcycle troops will hit the front lines.The 425th released a video of about two dozen soldiers riding tandem on off-road motorbikes, with each pair involving one driver and an infantryman wielding an assault rifle.
“The goal is to ride in, strike quickly at enemy positions, dismount, storm in, secure a foothold, and complete the mission successfully,” a Ukrainian soldier says in the video.
Analysts from the ISW said in late April that it’s likely Russia will start further incorporating motorcycles into its tactics for future attacks.
Lt. Col. Pavlo Shamshyn, spokesperson of Ukraine’s ground forces in Kharkiv, told local media that week that Kyiv believed the same.
“Our intelligence records the fact that in training centers on the territory of the Russian Federation and in the units themselves, active training of motorcycle drivers is taking place, and all this indicates that the assault operations of spring-summer 2025 will be carried out on motorcycles,” Shamshyn told Ukrainian outlet Suspilne. Business Insider
Yes, you are faster and more nimble. But you aren’t faster than bullets, artillery, anti-tank rounds. All you are doing is violating Murphys 7th Law which is to try to look unimportant and now speeding towards your death.
Now compared to the WWI tactics that both sides are using that has turned the war into a meat grinder being on a motorcycle seems worlds better but it isn’t.
A much more fuel-efficient means of dying.
Sadly.
“Git thar furstest with the mostest…” Bedford Forrest
We’ll see how this works out for both sides. Here’s a novel idea…Make peace you fools.
There are lots of videos showing the Ukrainians taking out motorcycle troops with small drones. Yep the motorcycles are “nimble” but if the driver isn’t skilled they are still easy meat for the drone operator as the videos show. No bike is as nimble as those small kamikaze drones.
Drones don’t bleed and they’re dispensable. Men? Not so much.
Do these bike drivers have to have DA Haircuts, wear mortorcycle jackets and carry Zippo lighters.?????
You forgot assless chaps, with tassels.
Bet that tickles!
Eric von Zipper?
“The 425th released a video of about two dozen soldiers riding tandem on off-road motorbikes, with each pair involving one driver and an infantryman wielding an assault rifle.”
Sounds like chariot warfare. Chariots became ineffective with advances in personal armor, tanks in the form of war elephants, and the development of horses that allowed mounted archers and armored cavalry to traverse terrain that chariots couldn’t handle. The analogy probably holds — these tandem-mounted motorcycle units probably have a very niche usefulness where there are no fortifications, armored vehicles, or inconvenient terrain.
It’s been a year or three since last I rode a dirt bike, but it seems to me a roll of concertina wire or two might slow those motorsickles down. Terrain also makes a difference. And riding double while wielding a weapon? Only in the movies.
One unexpected bump and that rifleman is back to using his LPCs.
There are definite downsides to this idea, but I’m more sanguine about it than the other commenters.
Often, the most efficient answer to hi-tech is lo-tech rather than an arms race to more and more sophisticated platforms. These tandem bike units might be easily adapted to, but they might be useful in the very short term. As long as they can quickly adapt in-turn, they might have a future.
It’s better to explore many options than get tunnel vision over one particular school of thought, like we did re: IEDs in Iraq. Instead of going off-road and being less predictable, we kept adding more and more armor to our HMMWVs and further restricting ourselves to those natural chokepoints (yes, that up-armor did save many lives – I’m not denying that it addressed one symptom of the deeper issue).