Ukraine Army's 'Invisibility Cloak' Ready for Mass Production: Developers

New military clothing designed to hide Ukrainian soldiers from Russian thermal imaging optics and cameras is ready for mass production, a member of the development team has told Newsweek, with the group behind the technology already able to produce 150 full "invisibility cloaks" each month.

Maxim Boryak, part of the team developing the cloak under the Brave1 research program organized by the Ukrainian government, said on Wednesday that the developers are already working on battlefield upgrades for the anti-thermal imaging device.

"We received positive feedback from the military who tested the cloak along with recommendations and wishes," Boryak said, adding he and his colleagues "hope that our scientific research will be crowned with success in the near future by an updated sample of the cloak."

Brave1 released a video of the cloak in testing this week, prompting Mykhailo Fedorov—Ukraine's vice prime minister for new technologies and the minister for digital transformation—to laud what he compared to "invisibility cloaks in fairy tales."

The technology is more complete than shown in the video, Boryak said. "In the video, you can see a person's face, which is not covered by a special mask; a protective mask is included in the cloak kit," he explained. "If you wear a protective mask and special glasses, it will 'blind' a thermal imager."

"Our production capacity is currently limited to 150 units per month, but if necessary, we can increase the volume of production," Boryak said. It is unclear whether or when the Ukrainian military might adopt the technology. Newsweek has contacted the Ukrainian Defense Ministry by email to request comment.

"The presented sample is ready for mass production and wide application in the area with the presence of natural vegetation, when a person is in any position: standing, sitting or lying down. It is allowed to use a cloak in an open area only in the lying position."

Boryak said the technology was designed with a variety of specialist units in mind, focused on troops that need to operate covertly. Special operations, reconnaissance, sabotage, sapper, and sniper teams are especially suitable, he said, as well as soldiers standing guard at trench observation posts and those conducting patrols at military sites.

Ukrainian soldiers using the cloaks will be limited, though. "The cloak masking properties are preserved indefinitely as long as the person in the cloak moves very slowly, so that the human body does not additionally release excess heat, for example, when moving quickly over the terrain."

"The cloak is designed for the slow positioning of a person in the place of dislocation and cannot be used during rapid movement, which is accompanied by excessive heat release and minor leakage through the ventilation holes in the cloak," Boryak said, though added that dangerous thermal leakage can be somewhat masked if the user is hidden among vegetation.

Russia's full-scale invasion has prompted rapid technological and tactical battlefield innovation, further charged by the creeping introduction of advanced Western military equipment. New anti-thermal technology could give Ukrainian troops a nighttime edge on battlefields that are now near-constantly surveilled by drones of various kinds, some of which boast advanced cameras.

"There will always be 'good' and 'evil' side by side, just like the battle of opposites between a new type of weapon and a means of defeating and neutralizing it," Boryak said. "That is why we do not stop at what we have achieved."

The plan now, he said, is "improving our product so that it can be used for fast movement in open terrain. Research is being conducted in this direction in cooperation with other scientists. It is planned to conduct full-scale tests of a new model of cloak with improved camouflage properties by the end of the year."

"It is necessary to wait a little until the end of the tests of the new material, which will be added to the new sample of the cloak, in order to expand the masking properties of the product."

Uncommon Knowledge

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