--- title: The first American autonomous ground vehicles are... description: Forterra has deployed over 100 autonomous Lancer ATVs in Ukraine over the past nine months, marking what the company claims is the largest deployment of US... canonical: https://daily.dev/posts/the-first-american-autonomous-ground-vehicles-are-fighting-in-ukraine-9jx2y2yrb twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:site: @dailydotdev og:type: website og:site_name: daily.dev og:title: The first American autonomous ground vehicles are fighting in Ukraine | daily.dev og:description: Forterra has deployed over 100 autonomous Lancer ATVs in Ukraine over the past nine months, marking what the company claims is the largest deployment of US... og:url: https://daily.dev/posts/the-first-american-autonomous-ground-vehicles-are-fighting-in-ukraine-9jx2y2yrb og:image: https://api.daily.dev/og/posts/9jx2y2Yrb.png og:image:alt: The first American autonomous ground vehicles are fighting in Ukraine og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 630 og:locale: en --- > ## Documentation Index > Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://daily.dev/llms.txt > Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further. # The first American autonomous ground vehicles are fighting in Ukraine **[TechCrunch](https://daily.dev/sources/tc)** · 6 min read · 0 upvotes · 1 comments ## Summary Forterra has deployed over 100 autonomous Lancer ATVs in Ukraine over the past nine months, marking what the company claims is the largest deployment of US autonomous ground vehicles in combat. The gas-powered vehicles, based on Polaris ATVs with custom sensors and compute, have completed 1,100+ missions, driven 2,500+ miles, and carried over 777,000 pounds of cargo including 52 casualty evacuations. Ukrainian soldiers have largely been teleoperating rather than fully autonomously running the vehicles, as current autonomy cannot yet react to live enemy threats. Key lessons learned include electronic warfare adaptation, remote software updates, and terrain navigation. Forterra is now combining classical robotics with generative AI to close the gap toward full battlefield autonomy, while facing pressure to reduce costs as attrition on the battlefield is significant. ## Full article daily.dev links to this article rather than hosting it. Read it at the original source: ## Questions this post answers ### How much cargo can Forterra's Lancer autonomous ground vehicle carry compared to Ukraine's own uncrewed ground vehicles? Forterra's Lancer, built on a gas-powered Polaris ATV chassis with a custom sensor and compute stack, carries up to 750 kilograms, while Ukraine's own battery-powered uncrewed ground vehicles typically carry only up to 250 kilograms. The Lancer's greater range and payload make it more versatile for logistics, resupply, and casualty evacuation missions in contested terrain. _daily.dev keeps engineers tracking real-world autonomy deployments like this close at hand._ ### Why are Ukrainian soldiers still manually teleoperating Forterra's autonomous ground vehicles instead of running them fully autonomously in combat? Soldiers mainly teleoperate the vehicles because the autonomy cannot yet identify and react to unexpected enemy threats in real time, such as ambushes or incoming fire, while navigating. The vehicles can drive autonomously across diverse terrain, but responding live to enemy contact in front of them remains beyond current capability, so human control fills that gap. _engineers weighing autonomy limits in high-stakes systems follow this kind of field data on daily.dev._ ### What has Forterra's combat deployment record been for its autonomous vehicles in Ukraine so far? Since arriving in Ukraine last October, Forterra's vehicles have driven more than 2,500 miles across over 1,100 missions, carried 777,440 pounds of total cargo, and completed 52 casualty evacuations. More than 100 vehicles have been deployed, with some lost in combat, particularly when stuck in mud or exposed terrain targeted by Russian forces. _anyone tracking how autonomous systems perform under real combat stress can follow updates like this on daily.dev._ ## Community discussion Top comments from developers on daily.dev. **@fabooy961** · 0 upvotes > testing in production - höhö > >  ## Similar posts on daily.dev - [Over 100 US-built autonomous ATVs have been fighting in Ukraine for nine months](https://daily.dev/posts/over-100-us-built-autonomous-atvs-have-been-fighting-in-ukraine-for-nine-months-sw029ndil) · The Next Web · 0 upvotes · 0 comments - [Stealth Ukraine Ground Drones Hunt In the Dark](https://daily.dev/posts/stealth-ukraine-ground-drones-hunt-in-the-dark-bjwn98xky) · IEEE Spectrum · 0 upvotes · 0 comments - [Ukrainian Combat Robot Holds Frontline Position for Six Weeks in Sign of Growing UGV Maturity](https://daily.dev/posts/ukrainian-combat-robot-holds-frontline-position-for-six-weeks-in-sign-of-growing-ugv-maturity-v77rwx2ul) · Hacker News · 0 upvotes · 0 comments - [UFORCE, Ukraine's first defence tech unicorn, has conducted 150,000 combat missions as unmanned warfare goes commercial](https://daily.dev/posts/uforce-ukraine-s-first-defence-tech-unicorn-has-conducted-150-000-combat-missions-as-unmanned-warf-kxotgud7d) · The Next Web · 1 upvotes · 0 comments - [Aurora expands self-driving trucks route to El Paso](https://daily.dev/posts/aurora-expands-self-driving-trucks-route-to-el-paso-m7zqn3enu) · TechCrunch · 0 upvotes · 0 comments --- Tags: [#genai](https://daily.dev/tags/genai), [#robotics](https://daily.dev/tags/robotics), [#defense-tech](https://daily.dev/tags/defense-tech) [View this post on daily.dev](https://daily.dev/posts/the-first-american-autonomous-ground-vehicles-are-fighting-in-ukraine-9jx2y2yrb) ```json {"@context":"https://schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"Organization","@id":"https://daily.dev/#organization","name":"daily.dev","url":"https://daily.dev","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://daily.dev/apple-touch-icon.png","width":180,"height":180},"sameAs":["https://twitter.com/dailydotdev","https://github.com/dailydotdev","https://www.linkedin.com/company/daily-dev-ltd"]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https://daily.dev/#website","url":"https://daily.dev","name":"daily.dev","publisher":{"@id":"https://daily.dev/#organization"},"potentialAction":{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https://daily.dev/search?q={search_term_string}"},"query-input":"required name=search_term_string"}}]} {"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"TechArticle","headline":"The first American autonomous ground vehicles are fighting in Ukraine","url":"https://daily.dev/posts/the-first-american-autonomous-ground-vehicles-are-fighting-in-ukraine-9jx2y2yrb","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://daily.dev/posts/the-first-american-autonomous-ground-vehicles-are-fighting-in-ukraine-9jx2y2yrb"},"datePublished":"2026-07-07T09:04:20.161Z","dateModified":"2026-09-14T08:00:59.552Z","description":"Forterra has deployed over 100 autonomous Lancer ATVs in Ukraine over the past nine months, marking what the company claims is the largest deployment of US...","image":"https://media.daily.dev/image/upload/f_auto,q_auto/v1/posts/84bea415696b4b33c4f80f692109aef4?_a=AQAEuop","thumbnailUrl":"https://media.daily.dev/image/upload/f_auto,q_auto/v1/posts/84bea415696b4b33c4f80f692109aef4?_a=AQAEuop","isAccessibleForFree":true,"articleSection":"TechCrunch","inLanguage":"en","publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"daily.dev","url":"https://daily.dev","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://daily.dev/apple-touch-icon.png","width":180,"height":180}},"author":{"@type":"Organization","name":"TechCrunch","logo":"https://media.daily.dev/image/upload/t_logo,f_auto/v1/logos/tc","url":"https://daily.dev/sources/tc"},"commentCount":1,"discussionUrl":"https://daily.dev/posts/the-first-american-autonomous-ground-vehicles-are-fighting-in-ukraine-9jx2y2yrb","interactionStatistic":[{"@type":"InteractionCounter","interactionType":{"@type":"LikeAction"},"userInteractionCount":0},{"@type":"InteractionCounter","interactionType":{"@type":"CommentAction"},"userInteractionCount":1}],"keywords":"genai,robotics,defense-tech","timeRequired":"PT6M"} {"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https://daily.dev"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"TechCrunch","item":"https://daily.dev/sources/tc"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"name":"The first American autonomous ground vehicles are fighting in Ukraine"}]} {"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://daily.dev/posts/the-first-american-autonomous-ground-vehicles-are-fighting-in-ukraine-9jx2y2yrb","comment":[{"@type":"Comment","text":"testing in production - höhö","datePublished":"2026-07-12T17:16:27.399Z","url":"https://daily.dev/posts/9jx2y2Yrb#c-jeMbDuKJy","author":{"@type":"Person","name":"Le Fä De Le Lö","url":"https://daily.dev/fabooy961","image":"https://media.daily.dev/image/upload/v1677218265/avatars/avatar_H6lLM2y9S4Yf8VCWicpd8.jpg"}}]} {"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"FAQPage","@id":"https://daily.dev/posts/the-first-american-autonomous-ground-vehicles-are-fighting-in-ukraine-9jx2y2yrb#faq","mainEntity":[{"@type":"Question","name":"How much cargo can Forterra's Lancer autonomous ground vehicle carry compared to Ukraine's own uncrewed ground vehicles?","acceptedAnswer":{"@type":"Answer","text":"Forterra's Lancer, built on a gas-powered Polaris ATV chassis with a custom sensor and compute stack, carries up to 750 kilograms, while Ukraine's own battery-powered uncrewed ground vehicles typically carry only up to 250 kilograms. 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