When Russia first launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine, the conflict drew comparisons to wars of the twentieth century. Tanks, armored personnel carriers, and artillery dominated the battlefield, and both sides’ infantry were dug into trenches. We witnessed this old-school style of war when we made our first visit to Ukraine in September 2022. Since then, we have made regular trips to Ukraine, affording us firsthand insight into a monumental transformation: the beginning of a new kind of warfare.

In summer 2023, the commander of Ukraine’s Third Assault Brigade’s Drone Unit, whom we’ll call Fil (not his real name), told us that a new weapon had begun to change the conflict: first-person-view drones. These small, cheap, maneuverable quadcopters transmit real-time footage to their operators and detonate kamikaze-style on their targets. That year, Ukraine flooded the field with thousands of them and Russia soon followed suit. Today, hundreds of thousands of these drones fill the Ukrainian skies.

What began as a war with drones has become a war of drones. Indeed, two years ago, a Ukrainian brigade’s strength was judged mostly by its inventory of Western-supplied tanks, armored personnel carriers, and artillery. Since 2023, however, drones have become the most important weapon on the battlefield. Because of their low cost, speed, and precision, drones have now largely supplanted traditional weaponry, including antitank missiles, mortars, tanks, and even artillery and aircraft. Today, a unit’s power and resilience are dictated by its number of skilled drone operators and its ability to deploy drones at scale. (One of us, Schmidt, has been a longtime investor in defense technology companies, and is currently an investor in companies supplying drones to Ukraine.)

This represents a profound shift in warfare, largely instigated by Ukraine to compensate for its shortfalls in conventional weapons and manpower. In the world’s first drone war, drones determine how battles are won and how soldiers die: Ukrainian drone strikes now account for 90 percent of destroyed Russian tanks and armored vehicles and 80 percent of Russian casualties. They have also made it possible for each side to attack far past the frontlines without having to gain air superiority over the battlefield. Ukraine, for example, hit Russian airbases 5,000 miles from Kyiv in June by smuggling drones across the border and launching them from the beds of trucks.

Russia, for its part, was originally slower to field drones in large numbers. But it has dramatically increased its production of first-person-view drones, as well as those used for strategic bombardment, such as the Iranian-designed Shahed. Today, Moscow matches Kyiv’s extraordinary rate of technological adaptation. It has developed equally capable models, such as the Orlan, which is used for surveillance, and the Lancet, which loiters over a target before exploding on impact.

Because Russia and Ukraine are constantly iterating on hardware, software, and tactics, the war changes at a breathtaking rate. The saturation of drone surveillance, for example, has made nearly all troop movement visible and therefore vulnerable, creating a transparent battlefield: anything that moves near the frontline is struck within a matter of minutes. Drone pilots have become prime targets, and with many traditional weapons rendered obsolete, drones are increasingly fighting other drones. Amid this cycle of innovation, the two sides are inching toward a new frontier: entirely automated warfare.

EYES EVERYWHERE

Surveillance and reconnaissance drones have become so ubiquitous that both Russian and Ukrainian forces scarcely move in the daylight. During a recent visit, we witnessed the motion of a single Russian van, five miles from the frontline, cause a sensation among drone operators, who then destroyed it. To avoid detection, movement near the frontline tends to take place during sunrise and sunset, when neither the daylight video cameras nor night-vision infrared cameras operate properly.

The fight for information advantage is always important in war, but even more so in this one, where it means the ability to form and maintain resilient drone-based sensor networks over the battlefield. If a unit is “blinded”—unable to maintain surveillance drones overhead—it becomes exceedingly vulnerable. For that reason, roughly 3,000 Ukrainian troops work around the clock to operate reconnaissance drones, mostly Chinese-made DJI Mavics, along the entire 750-mile frontline. Ukrainian brigade command centers display as many as 60 of these drone feeds around the clock.

This transparency means that the military maxim “what can be seen can be hit” is truer on today’s battlefield than at any point in history. It is nearly impossible for either side to mass and maneuver forces along the frontline, as troops are now easily spotted forming up for attack. The Russian army has historically relied on its ability to deliver impressive firepower through concentrated tube and rocket artillery fire, but these tactics are useless when any attempt to amass forces is identified within minutes. Russian guns are now widely dispersed, deeply dug in, and operate primarily at night.

Both Russian and Ukrainian forces scarcely move in the daylight.

Fil says his team has expanded from 400 troops in 2023 to over 1,000 now, and he expects it to continue to grow in the coming months. The brigade’s frontline operations are driven by data, of which there is more every day. Fil’s brigade, for example, tracks every engagement, drone mission, and vehicle or piece of equipment hit. That data, in turn, drives decision-making, including over the kinds and quantities of drones to procure. Fil’s team spends nearly $2 million each month on small quadcopters, mostly Mavics, for frontline reconnaissance and more than $500,000 per month for longer-range fixed-wing surveillance drones, such as Sharks or Lelekas, that can be used to see much farther from the frontline.

This is expensive, but one new battle tank costs more than $10 million. A tank was long regarded as the best weapon to defeat another tank; now, a first-person-view drone costing less than $800 is, thanks to its ability to strike with precision and move much faster than any ground vehicle. No armored vehicle—no matter its camouflage or anti-drone barriers—can survive for long on the modern, drone-swept battlefield. As a result, Ukrainian soldiers believe tank-led assaults to be suicidal. Russia still launches them occasionally, but most do not make it to the front line.

In response, Russia has shifted primarily to infantry assaults. It is no surprise, then, that more than 75 percent of Ukrainian drones now target infantry. Because surveillance drones have a difficult time spotting scattered infantry in urban terrain and forests, the Russians are deploying small assault groups, typically consisting of five or six teams of two to three people, to simultaneously attack a concentrated area. In recent months, the Russians have turned to motorcycles to more rapidly cross no man’s land—a shocking contrast to the line of tanks that rolled toward Kyiv in the earliest days of the conflict. When surviving members of a Russian assault group reach a building, they immediately dig in. Gradually, more soldiers join them. Over days or even weeks, the Russians gather their forces until they judge that they have sufficient strength to make the next bound toward Ukrainian positions. According to an officer from Ukraine’s Azov Brigade, Russia’s “cheap infantry”—its disregard for soldiers’ survival—allows for this kind of constant experimentation.

DRONE ON DRONE

Because drones have become so important to almost all battlefield operations, destroying them has become critical. Drone-on-drone battle is now a central part of the war. Last year, an estimated 1,200 Russian surveillance drones were operating behind Ukrainian lines on a given day, so Ukraine built the first drone-based air defense system to fend them off. Its forces began using first-person-view drones to chase down larger, slower, and much more expensive surveillance drones. Russian surveillance drones now fly higher to avoid Ukrainian interception. Still, roughly 80 percent of all surveillance drones that cross the frontline, be they Russian or Ukrainian, are shot down by either interceptors or traditional air defenses. Because of these changes, Russia has dramatically reduced its use of Lancet drones. Instead, it has developed smaller, faster, and camouflaged surveillance drones, including some with rear-facing cameras, that let operators spot and evade pursuing drones. 

Unsurprisingly, drone pilots and their control stations have become prime targets for both sides. Fil’s unit has found that a successful attack on Russian Mavic operators can pause enemy activity for three days. Because pilots have become such a precious resource, integral to defending the infantry, Ukraine is working to relocate as many of them as possible away from the frontlines to integrated remote operations. In an attempt to further decrease the number of forward-deployed soldiers, Ukraine is now working to establish a so-called drone line along its entire frontline—a layered defense corridor six or seven miles wide, made up of obstacles such as ditches, minefields, and razor wire, and hundreds of drone teams that wait at the ready to destroy any targets before they reach Ukrainian positions. Once this barrier is in place, and more drone functions are automated, far fewer troops will need to defend the frontline. Ukraine hopes that this approach will help alleviate its manpower shortfalls and save lives.

Behind the frontlines, tactics are evolving just as fast. On a nightly basis, Russia launches hundreds of Shahed long-range drones at Ukraine, particularly its major cities. Russia increasingly uses sequenced launches and circuitous route planning so that multiple drones arrive at their target simultaneously from different directions; these attacks amount to manually coordinated “drone swarms.” Short of air defense systems, Ukraine has prioritized the development and production of interceptor drones to counter these swarms. Russia also sends dozens of cheaper “dummy” drones—drones without real capabilities—into Ukrainian airspace, forcing air defense radars to reveal their locations. Russian ballistic and cruise missiles then route around the defenses to strike their targets.

ITERATION OR OBLITERATION

The speed of technological adaptation and iteration—or innovation power—is a new measure of combat strength. The key to adaptation is the lightning-fast feedback loop from operator to engineer. The best Ukrainian drone pilots, therefore, are both tactician and technician, able to make modifications and improvements on the fly.

Consequently, the most important progress in drone development is happening at the front. Operators are supported by research and development labs and manufacturing and repair facilities located near the frontlines. Drone teams constantly test and deploy new radios, antennas, and circuit boards; software updates are pushed out on a near-daily basis. To create an effective weapon now requires adapting and iterating against an equally adaptive adversary, resulting in a highly dynamic contest of action and reaction.

Once a new weapon or technique is introduced to the battlefield, it has a limited window of utility before the opponent develops countermeasures. New kinds of drones appear at a rapid rate: two years ago, the Russian Lancet was the most threatening model. Last year, it was the first-person-view drone. Now, strike drones controlled by fiber-optic cables, first fielded by the Russians, have taken hold of the frontline.

Unlike drones that run on standard radio frequency, these quadcopters spool up to 25 miles of fiber-optic cable in their wake, leaving them hard-wired to their operator. Although these drones are slow and limited by the length of their wire, they are impervious to jamming, relay clear images, and can operate outside radio line of sight, which means that they are well suited for hilly and urban terrain. Since they do not emit radio signals, their pilot’s location cannot be identified by electronic means, and they strike with shocking precision.

Fiber-optic drones are effective ambush weapons. Russians fly them across the frontline and park these models on roads or rooftops and wait for passing vehicles. Their high-quality control signal and camera resolution allows them to be maneuvered with pinpoint accuracy into tight areas, such as buildings and bunkers, that normal first-person-view drones, which rely on radio, cannot access. Russia now has elite units of drone pilots using fiber-optic drones stationed along heavily contested parts of the frontline in order to target Ukrainian drone operators, attack enemy supply lines, and ultimately isolate forward units.

Drone innovation is not just about making drones better but also about driving down their cost. Over the course of the past year, both Ukrainian and Russian drone units have replaced the pricey few with the inexpensive plenty. Expensive drones, including the Russian Lancet and the American Switchblade 600, which each cost between $65,000 and $150,000, are being pushed aside in favor of fixed-wing strike drones, such as the Russian Molniya and the Ukrainian Dart, both of which cost less than $3,000. Because Molniya kamikaze drones are so cheap, Russia uses them as a mass strike weapon, sometimes launching 15 at a single target.

For the most part, Ukraine still uses first-person-view drones because they are cheap, relatively easy to use, and readily available. Brigades on the most active fronts consume more than 5,000 of them per month. But because their rate of success in striking a target is low, estimated at no more than ten percent for the average unit, many frontline units favor larger bomber-type drones for their versatility, reusability, and modular configurations. A single Ukrainian-made Vampire hexacopter drone, for example, can drop antitank mines or rain down munitions on enemy infantry, achieving the same effect as dozens of artillery rounds, and with greater precision. And because they are both reusable and have a larger payload than first-person-view drones, bomber drones can saturate the ground with high explosives much more rapidly and at much lower cost. They are also better at targeting infantry when repelling assaults and can collapse buildings with a few accurately placed explosives that would otherwise have taken hundreds of artillery rounds.

Bomber drones can also place mines, a tactic that is quickly becoming one of the most effective ways to halt Russian assaults. Russian units on the attack must use largely predictable routes because of terrain, so Ukrainian forces create a dynamic, mobile minefield by dropping mines in their path. Ukrainian forces then use first-person-view drones to herd Russian vehicles toward the mines. One Ukrainian brigade estimates that 50 percent of enemy vehicle kills in recent months have resulted from drone mining. Ukrainians also use bomber drones to run continuous waves of attacks, similar to artillery bombardments, to keep Russian infantry suppressed, underground, and unable to advance.

Ukraine still employs its legacy systems, such as artillery, to support its drone tactics. When Russian infantry are protecting a valuable target, for instance, Ukrainian troops use artillery to suppress the infantry so that Ukrainian bomber drones can destroy the target without being shot down. Ukrainian troops will also use surveillance drones to ascertain where Russian drone pilots are before shelling those locations. These approaches allow Ukraine to minimize its use of expensive legacy systems that can be difficult to acquire; Russia, by contrast, has less need to adapt its use of these systems because it can afford to expend shells in quantities that Ukraine cannot.

SWARM AND ATTACK

Automating drones with artificial intelligence would solve a variety of problems facing the modern warfighter. A large number of drones are lost to pilot error. And the Ukrainian battlefield is saturated with systems that jam and spoof signals across the electromagnetic spectrum, making it difficult to rely on any technology that requires constant radio connection to a human operator. Thousands of Ukrainian troops operate Mavics all day, every day, a function that could certainly be automated. Collecting and processing surveillance data automatically—ideally from multiple layers of sensors across the frontline—would save hundreds of man-hours a week. And current systems require drone pilots to operate close to the frontline, putting them at risk.

Today, algorithms can augment human control of the battlefield. They reduce error by helping pilots detect, track, approach, and strike targets. AI targeting systems are trained nightly on combat footage to adjust to Russian countermeasures, such as camouflage or decoys. Ukrainian and Western companies are creating software that supports drone pilots even more, by selecting routes, stabilizing flights, navigating to waypoints, recognizing targets, and guiding toward the destination. If these efforts are successful, becoming a drone pilot will require fewer skills and less experience.

In particular, defense firms are keen to develop AI tools that make it easier to carry out the final phase of an attack. The Ukrainian battlefield is a challenge for machine learning because enemy tanks and artillery pieces constantly change appearance with added armor and camouflage. Algorithms also perform poorly at identifying scattered infantry, particularly in dense forests or other complex terrain. AI-assisted target acquisition and terminal guidance have already proved effective even in the face of radio signal jamming. Although the future of fully autonomous drones is unclear, a more autonomous drone strike complex—one that combines reconnaissance and strike drones to identify, track, and hit moving targets—would enormously improve Ukraine’s ability to defend against Russian attacks.

The next phase of the war will be determined by software.

Defense companies are also racing to create AI that can coordinate attacks by multiple drones in an automated drone swarm—the holy grail of drone operations. Today, Ukrainian forces can form a carousel of drones over a target to repeatedly strike at it, but doing so requires multiple pilots and operators. With an automated drone swarm, a single pilot could guide many drones, flying independent routes, to overwhelm defenses and saturate a target.

To pull off such a feat, defense firms will need to develop AI-powered systems that enable drones to communicate automatically—not just with one another but also with a host of sensors. These networks exist, but not at the required scale. And the task is getting harder each day: as the drone-versus-drone war escalates, the quantity of drones deployed in each operation will grow from hundreds to thousands, making their automated coordination increasingly difficult.

Eventually, Ukraine will need its own version of Israel’s Iron Dome air defense network to protect its cities and factories from Russia’s constant drone and missile raids. Of course, Ukraine’s vast size makes this a daunting challenge, but it can begin by shielding its major cities. Greater automation will be key to fending off Russian attacks. Whereas the first phase of the war was defined by hardware, with each side competing to invent new kinds of drones, payload, and munitions, the next phase of the war will be determined by software.

WAR OF FACTORIES

Drones have upended the old ways of war. Military doctrine, tactics, and organization will never be the same. Armies everywhere will need to completely revamp their doctrine and training to reflect the realities of fighting on a drone-swept battlefield. And the best way to prepare for the future of combat is to speak to those fighting this war.

Historians often call World War II a “war of factories.” The same is true for the war in Ukraine today. Ukraine produced more than two million drones in 2024 and plans to make over four million by the end of 2025. Its adversary is also getting better at drone production: last year, Russia was building 300 Shahed drones a month. Now, it can produce 5,000 in the same time frame. The side that consistently builds the most drones is the one most likely to prevail. And it is in the interest of the West, and of the United States in particular, to support the Ukrainian people in their dogged determination to win that fight—not only for Ukraine’s sake but also for its own, so it can learn to reckon with this new reality of war.