How Ukraine's drone strike upends the rules of warfare [View all]

By Benjamin Jensen / For The Conversation

A series of blasts at airbases deep inside Russia on June 1, came as a rude awakening to Moscow’s military strategists.

The Ukrainian strike at the heart Russia’s strategic bombing capability could also upend the traditional rules of war: It provides smaller military a blueprint for countering a larger nation’s ability to launch airstrikes from deep behind the front lines.

Ukraine’s Operation Spider Web involved 117 remote-controlled drones that were smuggled into Russia over an 18-month period and launched toward parked aircraft by operators miles away.

The raid destroyed or degraded more than 40 Tu-95, Tu-160 and Tu-22 M3 strategic bombers, as well as an A-50 airborne-early-warning jet, according to officials in Kyiv. That would represent roughly one-third of Russia’s long-range strike fleet and about $7 billion in hardware. Even if satellite imagery ultimately pares back those numbers, the scale of the damage is hard to miss.

https://www.heraldnet.com/opinion/comment-how-ukraines-drone-strike-upends-the-rules-of-warfare/