#504 – Russia-Ukraine War: Putin, Zelenskyy, Drones and the Future of Warfare

Modern battlefield tactics have been transformed by the explosive proliferation and tactical integration of unmanned drones. Both Russia and Ukraine have shifted from scarce, expensive platforms to massed, low-cost systems as drones come to outnumber personnel and armored vehicles on the battlefield.

Scale and Types of Battlefield Unmanned Systems

Reconnaissance drones, typically large and fixed-wing, patrol the skies for long durations at low cost. Their primary role is information gathering; when a target is identified, this intelligence is relayed for engagement by strike drones. The workhorse of modern drone warfare is the FPV quadcopter: a small, highly maneuverable, camera-equipped drone (measuring 12–20 inches across) fitted with munitions tailored for anti-personnel, anti-vehicle, or fortification targeting. Originally experimental in early 2023, FPV quads now fill the battlefield—stacks of these drones are so numerous that photos such as North Korea’s Kim Jong-un walking through aisles of them are not uncommon. Daily expenditure of FPV drones per side can reach 8,000 to 10,000, far outnumbering personnel and traditional equipment.

Another innovation is the fiber-optic drone, introduced to address electronic jamming that disrupts radio-controlled drones. These drones spool out a fine, filament-like cable back to the operator, rendering them immune to electronic attacks. While heavier and requiring slower, more careful piloting—operators must avoid snags across obstacles like trees and wires—fiber-optic drones can penetrate jammed zones up to 50 kilometers from operators. Though they comprise less than 15% of the drone arsenal, their resilience to jamming and low detectability make them crucial, and they are now widely used by Russian and Ukrainian forces.

Manpower and Human Operators Behind Remotely Controlled Systems

Despite technical advances and media misconceptions, nearly all battlefield drones remain human-controlled. A typical drone operation requires teams of two or three: a pilot, co-pilot/navigator, and sometimes an armament specialist or technician. Operating drones, especially FPVs, is mentally taxing—requiring continuous, high-concentration screen time in dynamic, often chaotic environments. There is virtually no true autonomy; nearly every drone is remotely piloted in real-time, including uncrewed ground vehicles and attack systems. This creates a manpower-intensive war, with extensive support and logistics needed behind every sortie.

Integration With Artillery and Defense in Operations

Artillery remains critical, shaping the battlefield by forcing enemy troops to disperse and creating difficulties for concentrated assaults. Even with minimal usage, the mere presence of artillery slows assaults and exposes enemy forces to drone strikes. Control of the front is often decided by which side better suppresses the other’s drone units—using a mixture of drone-on-drone strikes, conventional artillery, and in Russia’s case, standoff glide bombs deployed from aircraft. Defensive strategies, particularly for Ukraine, rely on a layered approach: minefields to restrict mobility, overlapping artillery, and dense drone deployments to engage enemy forces before reaching main defensive lines.

Yet, drones have limitations—especially in poor weather (rain, high winds)—so artillery continues to provide essential, year-round defense capabilities. Minefields and artillery-drone networks together establish defensive depth, deterring and disrupting mechanized assaults.

Casualty Ratios and Resources to Achieve Tactical Objectives

Contrary to viral battlefield clips, it often takes a large quantity of drones to destroy a high-value target: eliminating a well-armored vehicle such as a tank can require anywhere from 10 up to 79 drones, though 30–40 is the norm for modern, protected machines with electronic defenses. When targeting personnel, the ratio averages to about five drones per individual killed, although outlier cases may need more. Mec ...

Military analysts highlight a widening rift between Russia’s expansive political demands and its military capacity in Ukraine, contrasting this with Ukraine’s more realistic goals and underscoring the generational consequences for Russia.

Russia's Maximalist Objectives Exceed Current Military Capabilities

Russian leadership—driven by Vladimir Putin—has set out ambitious objectives in its war against Ukraine. These go well beyond the means available to the Russian military. Putin’s maximalist territorial goals include the complete conquest of Donbas as well as large swathes of Kharkiv, Zaporizhia, Dnipro, Luhansk, and other contested areas. Russian forces operate along a 1,200 kilometer front with varying priorities, but Donbas remains a key target. Yet, despite ongoing operations, Russia is unable to secure these territories and is not on a path to take them soon.

In addition to territorial gains, Russia’s demands include significant national concessions from Ukraine. These encompass restricting the size and capability of Ukraine’s military, guaranteeing that Western forces will never be based in Ukraine, and barring Ukraine from joining NATO. The Kremlin also seeks formal recognition of its annexations, protection of the Russian language’s status, influence for the Russian Orthodox Church, and other lasting changes that would cement its political leverage over Ukraine. Underlying these demands is a drive to legitimize Russia’s wartime gains, create permanent concessions, and reshape Ukraine’s sovereignty and identity.

Widening Gap Between Military Performance and Political Demands

Despite these broad ambitions, the Russian army has failed to make significant advances, especially in Donbas, even after sustained offensive operations through 2025. The military faces tactical setbacks and stalled momentum across the front. By the summer of 2025, despite prioritizing the capture of the remaining 20-plus percent of Donbas, Russian forces lack a reasonable path or timeline to achieve even this reduced goal given entrenched Ukrainian defenses and their own limitations. As Preston Stewart notes, Russian claims about quickly taking cities such as Kherson or further advances in Zaporizhia are implausible, requiring difficult river crossings that no observer deems achievable by Russia at this point.

These shortcomings highlight the fundamental mismatch between the Kremlin’s ambitions and Russia’s current military reality. Even minimalist objectives are elusive, and yet Moscow persists in its maximalist demands, a problem rooted in Putin’s unwillingness to revise his political aims despite mounting evidence that they are unattainable.

Ukraine's Political Goals Align With Military Performance

In contrast, Ukraine’s political and military strategy reflects a pragmatic alignment. Ukrainian leadership demands a ceasefire along existing lines of control, repatriation of displaced persons—including children taken by Russia—and protection of critical infrastructure from ongoing strikes. These objectives are directly tied to battlefield realities.

Ukraine’s approach involves three interconnected goals: stabilize the frontlines to prevent further Russian advances, work toward liberating occupied territory where possible, and degrade Russian capacity through strategic strikes targeting military, infrastructure, and economic assets such as data centers vital to the Russian war effort. Air and missile defenses are p ...

The conduct of both Russian and Ukrainian militaries during the war reveals stark contrasts in command culture and the handling of battlefield information. Decisions by both leadership and units on the ground, as well as the accuracy of information passed through the ranks, directly impact operational effectiveness and the lives of soldiers.

Centralized Russian Command Structure Versus Decentralized Ukrainian Decision-Making

The Russian military operates on a deeply centralized, top-down command structure that restricts the ability of junior officers to make decisions based on changing ground conditions. Preston Stewart points out that when the Russian army was stalled trying to advance on Kyiv, instead of adapting, they stopped and waited for new orders. This approach resulted in a high number of senior officers being killed in the early weeks—these officers had to move toward the front to resolve issues such as traffic jams themselves because junior leaders lacked the authority to adapt independently.

In the Russian military, authority remains with senior commanders, who give fixed orders based on their scheme of maneuver. Junior troops execute these orders rather than adapting to the realities on the ground. This system often leads to a "garbage in, garbage out" scenario, where flawed or misleading information at the tactical level results in poor planning and execution. Russian soldiers are told to occupy specific places on maps, regardless of actual battlefield conditions.

In contrast, US and NATO training provided to Ukrainian forces emphasizes decentralized command and the empowerment of junior leaders. Ukrainian junior officers are expected to understand the commander's intent, enabling them to make on-the-spot tactical decisions even if explicit orders are unavailable. This Western-style approach fosters rapid innovation and tactical adaptation, which has manifested in creative uses of drones and diverse strategies across different Ukrainian units. Bottom-up innovation and flexibility have become defining advantages for Ukrainian forces against more rigid Russian formations.

Systemic Falsification of Battlefield Information in Russian Reporting

A key difference in Russian military practice is the widespread systemic falsification of battlefield information. Stewart describes a process where Russian soldiers may simply move forward, raise a flag to be filmed by a drone for propaganda purposes, and then report control over territory they do not, in fact, hold. Sometimes, even AI-generated fake videos are used. As a result, Russian military maps frequently exaggerate the area under their control by as much as 10–15 kilometers.

This distortion is not merely theoretical—it has deadly consequences. Russian commanders direct fire support and other resources to areas reported as held, but which are in fact contested or unsecured. As new units rotate into these areas, they encounter unexpected resistance or walk into ambushes, sometimes resulting in friendly fire or severe casualties.

The widespread nature of this information distortion affects the entire chain of command, up to Russia's political leadership. False reports shape operational planning, resulting in resource misallocation and strategic missteps, and even influence Vladimir Putin’s public assertions of progress in regions like the Donbas, despite actual battlefield stalemates.

Institutional Incentives Driving Information Falsification and Its Consequences

The root causes of these distortions are found in Russian military culture. Michael Kofman explains that deep-seated mistrust between soldiers and commanders, along with a severe punishment culture for mistakes, incentivizes dishonesty. Subordinates lie or exaggerate progress to avoid punitive consequences, while senior commanders perpetuate these falsehoods in their reports and then must allocate more troops or direct more aggressive operations to "achieve" the fabricated battlefield positions.

Because decision-making authority remains centralized, senior leaders are sometimes unaware that the reports they act on are inaccurate. The culture of rewarding only positive news—and punishing failure—ensures the upward flow of misinformation, further eroding ...

The Prrigozhin mutiny and the role of Wagner reflect significant tensions and evolving tactics within the Russian military system. The rapid rise and spectacular fall of Wagner expose both the effectiveness and the dangers of autonomous military power within an authoritarian regime.

Wagner's Rise as an Autonomous Military Rival

Wagner, led by Yevgeny Prigozhin, began the war in Ukraine as a semi-independent force, operating with significant autonomy despite being logistically and operationally supported by the Russian Ministry of Defense. Wagner flew on Ministry of Defense aircraft, trained at Ministry facilities, and had access to state resources, yet officially remained a private military company.

Wagner Competes With Russian Military For Resources, Credit, and Influence Within Russia's Elite

Prigozhin openly positioned Wagner as a more competent and successful alternative to the Russian military, developing a public rivalry with Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu and Chief of General Staff Valery Gerasimov. Wagner’s forces looked down on the regular Russian military, seeing them as incompetent, while the regular forces viewed Wagner’s troops as mercenaries or convicts. This internal competition became especially heated during the battle for Bakhmut and its surrounding actions, with Wagner and Russian airborne forces vying for credit in taking key positions.

Throughout 2022 and into 2023, Wagner’s popularity soared—so much so that Wagner and Prigozhin became the best-known names among Russian military formations, overshadowing regular army units and baffling even Russia’s Internet Research Agency as to where their support should be placed during the June 2023 mutiny.

The Group Showed Autonomy in Operations With Support From the Russian Ministry of Defense, Enabling Prigozhin to Gain Control and a Following

Wagner operated as a privatized army with growing autonomy, sometimes serving Russian interests abroad in places like Syria and Africa. Prigozhin’s ability to recruit from Russian prisons drastically expanded Wagner’s manpower. The group’s independence allowed Prigozhin to build a loyal following and amplify his influence among military elites and segments of the public.

Wagner's Effectiveness Stemmed From Innovative Tactics and Experienced Recruits, While Regular Russian Forces Saw Them As Mercenaries or Convicts, Competing For Credit

Wagner’s effectiveness derived from a combination of innovative tactics and the integration of experienced, well-trained assault troops with waves of convict recruits. Their reputation amongst Russian forces was mixed—respected for results and aggression but resented and ridiculed for their reliance on ex-convicts and mercenary status.

Battle of Bakhmut and Wagner's Attrition Strategy

Battle of Bakhmut: August 2022 - May 2023, a Highly Destructive Urban Conflict

The battle for Bakhmut, running from August 2022 to May 2023, became the most significant and destructive battle of the war. Bakhmut, a medium-sized city with industrial zones and apartment blocks, became a declared "fortress," tying down massive forces from both sides in brutal, close-quarters urban combat. Systematic artillery, tank fire, and relentless infantry assaults devastated the city, which sat on lower terrain and was divided by a small river.

Wagner Used Convicts to Exhaust Ukrainians, While Experienced Personnel Attacked and Russian Airborne Secured Flanks

Wagner’s primary tactic was to exhaust Ukrainian troops by sending repeated waves of convict assault units. These expendable recruits would force Ukrainian defenders to use ammunition and energy, and once positions were weakened, Wagner’s lethal, well-trained assault groups would attack. Meanwhile, Russian airborne units protected Wagner’s flanks and provided artillery support, maximizing the effectiveness of Wagner’s frontal assaults.

Russians Capture a Worthless City After Bakhmut Fall, Showcasing Pyrrhic Victory

Although Russian and Wagner forces eventually took Bakhmut, the city was left in ruins, and the cost was enormous in terms of men and material. The victory was largely symbolic—a Pyrrhic triumph for Wagner and Russia, as the city held no remaining strategic value after its destruction.

Mutiny and Political Implications for Russian Authority

Prigozhin Initiated the June 2023 Mutiny When the Russian Defense Ministry Demanded Wagner Personnel Sign Regular Military Contracts, Eliminating Wagner's Autonomy

After Bakhmut fell, the Ministry of Defense, frustrated by Wagner’s autonomy, issued an ultimatum: all Wagner personnel must sign regular military contracts, effectively dissolving Wagner’s independent status.

Wagner Seized Rostov Hq, Advanced Toward Moscow With Armor and Air Defense to Negotiate Amnesty Instead Of Regime Change

On June 23-24, 2023, Prigozhin responded by launching a short-lived mutiny. Wagner forces seized the Russian southern military headquarters in Rostov-on-Don and began a rapid armored advance toward Moscow, even shooting down Russian helicopters and planes. The column advancing toward Moscow was mechanized, with tanks, armored vehicles, and air defense—revealing Wagner’s operational competence and resources. However, the real aim was not regime change, but to use the advance as leverage in negotiations with the Kremlin, seeking amnesty and favorable terms for Wagner and Prigozhin.

Mutiny Showed Elite Factions In Russia Didn't See Prigozhin As Viable Alternative to Putin, Undermining Successful Coup or Regime Change

Despite the chaos, Prigozhin never secured sufficient elite backing. Russian power is highly personalistic, and potential alternatives are routinely eliminated before they become threats. No major faction viewed Prigozhin as a viable replacem ...

Russian Unwillingness to Negotiate From Weakness

Michael Kofman observes that there is currently no willingness from Russia to negotiate a settlement to the ongoing war. Russia remains committed to fighting over negotiations unless its maximalist objectives are met. The Kremlin views the continuation of hostilities as preferable to any settlement that would require compromising on core demands. Russia also actively seeks to undermine Ukraine's bargaining position by testing winter strike campaigns, targeting critical infrastructure, and attempting to sap Ukraine’s economic and military endurance. Additionally, Kofman suggests that President Putin is likely waiting to see both the effects of these winter strikes on Ukraine and the outcome of spring European elections. There is a possibility that changes in government or public opinion within European countries could shift the negotiating position in Russia’s favor, making future negotiations more advantageous for the Kremlin.

Compartmentalized Ceasefire as a Possible Initial Step

A compartmentalized or partial ceasefire could serve as a confidence-building measure and an entry point for broader talks. Such arrangements might begin with agreements to halt air and missile strikes on energy infrastructure or restrict actions against shipping in the Black Sea—areas that have seen escalation and inflicted significant hardship. This sort of limited ceasefire could be implemented for a set period, ranging from days to weeks, to test commitments from both sides and signal genuine interest in a political process. However, even these limited arrangements have long been possible, yet Russia has shown no interest in pursuing them. Moscow remains disinterested, preferring not to even initiate this kind of step unless larger issues are resolved in its favor first.

Danger of Failed Ceasefires Leading To Renewed Conflict

There is a significant danger that failed ceasefire agreements can simply end up being pauses in fighting that allow for rearmament, rather than stepping stones to lasting peace. The previous Minsk I and II accords serve as historical precedents, with each functioning more as a rearmament period that eventually led to renewed and intensified fighting. For Ukraine, post-ceasefire vulnerability is acute; once hostilities halt, the country will have to demobilize front-line soldiers eager to return home, while Russia, with a force composed more of contracted soldiers, may maintain a ready military posture. This imbalance could give Russia a strategic advantage if war resumes. Ceasefires reached without genuine U.S. or European security guarantees also place Ukraine at risk: a mere piece of paper affirming intent may not suffice if Russia is able to regroup, rearm, and ultimately reignite the conflict.

Historical Pattern of Multiple Wars in Territorial Disputes

Kofman notes that persistent conflict is the historical norm in unresolved territorial disputes. Wars between India and Pakistan, the Arab-Israeli conflict, and fighting between Armenia and Azerbaijan are cited as examples where ceasefires often become interim periods between new eruptions of violence, rather than paths to lasting peace. Ukraine’s geography, its vulnerable position, and its long history with Russia create a particular risk that a ceasefire could simply provide Moscow a window to reposition and rearm for future conquest attempts. A lasting peace must involve both an end to fighting and credible security arrangements that deter renewed aggression and address the deeper issue of Russian imperial ambitions.

Long-Term Viability of Ukraine as Independent State

Ukraine's future as a viable independent state depends heavily on sustained European engagement and recognition of Ukraine’s central role in European security. Despite immense damage to its economy and the exodus of people from its cities as a result of Russia’s military campaign, Kofman asserts that Ukraine’s independence and national identity have been robustly affirmed. However, for Ukraine to rebuild its economy, restore population stability, and maintain territorial integrity, ongoing external support—especially from European countrie ...