The Drone War Is Our Current Military Revolution

Military policy makers need to get over their discomfort with the implications

During the first week of April, Ukrainian drones struck the only known fiber optics plant in Russia. Located at Saransk in Mordovia Oblast, PJSC Optical Fiber Systems is more than 430 miles (700 km) from Ukraine. A simultaneous strike on the Promsintez chemical plant in Chapaevsk Samara Oblast, located almost 550 miles (877 km) from Ukraine, reportedly “damaged the production line, storage facilities, and administrative buildings. A nitric acid leak was also reported in the area.”

Small drones dominate the tactical airspace over the battlefields of Ukraine. Attack drones dominate the strategic bombing war between Russia and Ukraine. Drone-centric operations are the dominant mode of conflict between the combatants. Drones stretch defenses to their limits. Drones are increasingly engaging enemy drones in combat and counter-UAS technologies are the hot new defense industry catalog. The current military revolution is all about drones.

While the Promsintez plant makes explosives, which have obvious military uses, the strategic Saransk strike was aimed at diminishing Russian production of tactical fiber optic guided (FOG) drones. Drone war is here, and here to stay, so every standing military force must adapt or face defeat. Policy makers must get past their skepticism, get over their doubts. We are witnessing the immediate future of warfare. (I’ll leave the ‘FOG of war’ puns to someone else.)