Yurii Poita*

The Russian invasion of Ukraine and the subsequent Russian-Ukrainian full-scale war demonstrated that the high technologies of modern warfare in many cases became “critical enablers” or so-called “game-changers”[1] and made it possible to achieve operational and sometimes strategic superiority over the enemy.[2] In particular, this concerns the use of high-speed Internet communication “Starlink” for the organization of communication and Command and Control (C2)[3], artillery high-precision ammunition with GPS guidance M982 Excalibur and M142 HIMARS missiles, reconnaissance and strike air, sea and land drones, which ensured the transparency of the battlefield, and in many cases changed the dynamics of the war.[4]

At the same time, it cannot yet be said that technological war has completely transformed traditional war, since a number of traditional means, such as the superiority of artillery fire, powerful aerial bombs, a large number of troops, aviation, missiles (especially if they are equipped with modern systems reconnaissance and guidance), remains an important factor even in modern warfare.[5] The purpose of this article is to analyze the use of means of modern and traditional warfare on the example of the Russian-Ukrainian war.

In general, modern wars differ from traditional ones in the use of high technologies, the latest, accurate and intelligent weapons, smaller scale of operations (focusing more on asymmetric strikes)[6]. For example, in modern wars, the latest technologies are increasingly used, such as drones, satellite systems, artificial intelligence, etc.[7] This makes it possible to significantly improve the effectiveness of reconnaissance, communication and control, and the accuracy of the use of weapons. In the same aspect, an important element is cyberattacking, which make it possible to weaken the enemy’s communications, disrupt the functioning of its critical infrastructure, banking and financial systems, and reduce the efficiency of its economy. [8] Secondly, non-governmental actors, such as terrorist and guerrilla groups, or private military companies are widely used in modern warfare. This makes conflicts less clear and preserves the “fog of the war”, allows to hide the role of a specific government, and mislead the enemy and the international environment, creating the illusion of a civil war, etc. Thirdly, modern warfare, in addition to purely military means, includes the complex and coordinated use of the entire range of means of pressure on the enemy: information operations, propaganda, economic sanctions, political and diplomatic pressure, disabling its critical infrastructure. Fourthly, modern warfare is focused on rapid, precise military operations (mainly against irregular partisan formations or terrorist groups), while traditional warfare is characterized by the confrontation of hundreds of thousands of soldiers and the conduct of operational and strategic operations with the use of thousands of tanks, artillery and armored vehicles, hundreds of planes, dozens of warships.[9] After all, modern warfare has a significant informational component within the framework of the so-called informational or cognitive warfare[10] and manipulation of consciousness,[11] at the stages of preparation, conduct and end of the war, with the aim of undermining the moral and psychological state of the enemy and weakening the resistance of his government, institutions, armed forces, the population, as well as the support of partners.[12]

Russian-Ukrainian war contains most of the elements of modern warfare: cyber-attacks; disinformation to influence the public’s consciousness; informational and psychological operations against the government and foreign partners; economic sanctions and strikes on critical infrastructure, energy, oil and gas facilities; involvement of irregular military formations (the so-called private military campaign), etc. Due to the large number of features, a review of the technological element will be conducted, namely the development of new weapons and technologies and changes in this connection, the nature and results of hostilities, organizational structures.

The most visible development in the Russian-Ukrainian war was the extremely wide use of drones of various types, which became an indispensable element of military operations, significantly improved the capabilities of ISR, kinetic strikes, providing logistics, evacuation of the wounded, mining and demining, and led to a change in a number of issues of the tactics of the use of troops. In particular, drones have become a mandatory element of every infantry military unit, which has allowed small military units to significantly increase their autonomy (due to better intelligence, in fact 24/7 on the frontline); significantly improve the strike capabilities of its artillery; allowed small military units to plan and conduct military operations relatively independently according to the Mission Command concept. As a result, in 2022 drones became a game-changer in favor of Ukraine (ensured the advantage of the military operations of Armed Forces of Ukraine during the liberation of Kyiv and Kharkiv regions), and during 2022-2024 – in the Black Sea (destroyed up to 30% of the Russian Black Sea Fleet, displaced it from the Western part of the Black Sea and ensured the operation of the maritime grain corridor of Ukraine[13] ).

At the same time, due to the rapid increase in the number of drones in Russian units in 2023, and the significant saturation of the front with them, this created problems for the Ukrainian troops, since the approach of heavy weapons to the frontline closer than 20 km is accompanied by a very high probability of being detected and hit immediately by 4-5 FPV-drones. The saturation of Russian troops with drones, including the disruption of the Ukrainian counteroffensive in 2023, forced a review of doctrines and concepts of the use of troops. In particular, the advantages of classic weapons – tanks and combat vehicles – were reduced, and maneuverable offensives were actually made impossible in these conditions. As a result, heavy weapons were moved to a safe distance and used to a limited extent, the delivery of ammunition, water, food, evacuation of the wounded, is carried out literally on foot (or with the help of air and ground drones) in the last 10 km to the frontline. For the effective use of heavy equipment, it is necessary to make the operation of enemy drones impossible or significantly difficult.

One of the organizational and structural consequences of the growing importance of drones in combat was the creation in the structure of the Armed Forces of Ukraine of a separate branch - the Unmanned Systems Forces, which will perform the tasks of providing units with drones, their technical support, recruiting and training specialists, as well as planning military operations involving unmanned systems.[14] They will also collect experience and interact with manufacturers of UAVs. Moreover, in the structure of each brigade, companies and then battalions of unmanned systems were created, as well as separate battalions, regiments and brigades of UAVs (including marine ones), which perform operational and strategictasks.[15]

Another consequence was the urgent need to protect against the enemy's reconnaissance and attack drones, which are capable of conducting reconnaissance and strikes both in the tactical and operational radius. This has increased the relevance of small and large EW devices, rope nets for protection against drones in dugouts and along logistics routes, kinetic means for destroying drones, as well as the development of anti-drone UAVs. Work on countering drones, as well as on solving the problems of organizing the interaction of drone units and EW (avoidance of “friendly fire”) continues both on the Ukrainian and Russian sides.

At the same time, the capabilities of the technologies of modern warfare still remain limited. Drones significantly supplemented, but did not fully replace traditional means of war in the Russian-Ukrainian conflict. In particular, a critical enabler and game changer for the Russian army in 2023 was the use of a huge number of artillery shells, a significant part of which was obtained from economically and technologically backward North Korea (as of June 2024 – up to 5 million 122-and 152-mm artillery shells[16]). Having achieved an advantage in artillery up to 5-10 times over Ukraine, the Russian troops are gradually moving forward. In this aspect, despite the economic and technological potential of the Western countries, which exceeds Russia by ten times, the countries of Europe could not achieve parity with Russian and North Korean shells, and their number was several times smaller. In 2025, recognizing the critical shortfall, European states and EU institutions began accelerating efforts to rebuild and scale up defense industrial capacity. Through initiatives such as the EU “Readiness 2030” roadmap and SAFE program, member states launched joint procurement and new production lines, signing contracts worth over €10 billion to increase ammunition and military equipment output.[17] It includes air and missile defence, artillery systems (advanced fire systems for precise, long-range attacks against land targets), ammunition and missiles (building strategic stockpiles and enhancing production capacity).[18]

Another traditional means was the massive use in 2024 of a significant number of corrected air bombs (KABs), weighing 500-1500 kg, which are fired by Russian aircraft at a distance of 40-50 km, which remains inaccessible to Ukrainian air defense, and hover at an angle to Ukrainian positions.[19] Despite relatively low accuracy, their considerable power (weight of the warhead 250-750 kg) and mass use allows Russia to easily raze even very well-equipped Ukrainian fortification positions and entire houses to the ground, thus leveling the defense of Ukraine. In the two months of 2024, the Russian aviation dropped more than 3500 KABs on Ukrainian positions (according to some data, 5000), which was 16 times more than in 2023, and was approximately 45 bombs per day (sometimes up to 100 bombs per day). It was KABs that became a factor in the success of the Russians in town Avdiivka.

As for countering drones, especially those that have good protection against the enemy's EW, the means of the first and second world wars and the Vietnam and Afghanistan wars have gained relevance. For example, the World War I-style A-22 and Yak-52 biplanes have proven effective against Russian and Iranian drones. In addition, their use is much cheaper than the use of a missiles, the cost of which is millions of dollars, against the Orlan-10 drone, which costs only 100 000 dollars. The use of civilian Yak-52 or A-22 aircraft costs only a few hundred dollars per hour. Also, Mi-8 helicopters with small arms on board are used to destroy “Shahed-136” drones. In addition, the German anti-aircraft systems “Gepard”, which are equipped with a pair of 35-mm Oerlikon KDA L/90 guns, have proven themselves well.

In this regards, Gustav Gressel, Senior Research Fellow at the European ouncil on Foreign Relations (ECFR) during the Ukraine-Japan forum of the “New Europe” Center noted that one of the lessons that Europe learned from the Russian-krainian war is that: a) old weapons are still deadly, especially if equipped with odern means of reconnaissance and guidance; b) the Russian-Ukrainian war is lso a confrontation between defense industries, and industrial resilience. This is the ost painful lesson, because the European defense industry is not keeping up when t comes to supporting Ukraine in the war.[20]

Firstly, at the moment, technological development in some matters competes with traditional weapons (for example, FPV-drones against tanks, or usage of FPV-drones instead of artillery etc.), and in some it complements it, making it more effective and deadly (for example, a drone as an element of reconnaissance for artillery or missile systems). A priority direction in the future may be the integration of AI technologies into drones, which can significantly improve the capabilities of weapons. At the same time, it is a mistake to completely abandon traditional weapons and replace them with high-tech ones. The Russia-Ukrainian war demonstrates that in some domains a quantitative advantage in conventional weapons can be more effective than a small number of high-tech but expensive means. Therefore, integration of traditional and modern weapons is necessary.

Secondly, the technological processes of military R&D should be reviewed and their maximum speed should be ensured. R&D that previously took decades may now could be uncompetitive due to the rapid integration of technologies and the creation of cheap and effective lethal weapons. Also, one should think about reducing the cost by scaling up the production of weapons. Expensive and complex“Patriot” missiles are exhausted very quickly if used against thousands of cheap decoy UAVs.

Thirdly, the war demonstrated both the importance of decentralized development and production and centralized but intelligent and flexible government management. During 2022-2024, the number of Ukrainian private companies producing drones reached 200, high competition leads to the speed of development and supplies to the military, improving the quality of products. This may be more effective than the bureaucratic and inertial state defense-industrial complex.

This leads us to the fourth conclusion, namely the need for effective public private cooperation. At the stage when it is necessary to quickly scale up production, government support should be included, for quick delivery to the troops, placing an order for production, providing funds and investing. In Ukraine, the success story is the Unmanned Systems Forces (successfully centralized the supply and maintenance of drones to the troops) and the project of the Ministry of Digital Transformation of Ukraine “Brave-1”, “Army of Drones” and “Accelerator of the Ministry of Defense”, which became a unifying platform between the army, developers, volunteers and sponsors. Work is currently underway on scaling up and creating ground drones.