Nathan Gardels at Noema:
When Vladimir Putin invaded Ukraine in 2022 with a direct assault on Kyiv, the conventional odds were that Russia’s post-Cold War military prowess, replete with a world-class nuclear arsenal, would readily conquer its former Soviet republic and fold it back into the restored empire.
Four years on, the battle not only still rages but it has also changed the nature of warfare as the first conflict to use AI-assisted precision-guided drones. Though pounded regularly by Russia, not least with hypersonic missiles as well as waves of drones, Ukraine has achieved the once unimaginable. It has increasingly brought the war deep into the Russian homeland, most recently hitting St. Petersburg — 1,000 miles away from Kyiv — with a drone strike on an oil refinery and military base supporting Russia’s war effort.
Similarly, the most damage done to the integral infrastructure of the oil-and-gas-rich U.S.-allied Gulf States at the height of the hot war with Iran was inflicted by inexpensive drone swarms launched by the theocratic state.
More here.
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