How drones, data, and AI transformed our military—and why the US must follow suit
A former Ukrainian commander-in-chief describes Ukraine’s DELTA battlefield-management system and other adaptations.
Gen. Valerii Zaluzhnyi | April 10, 2025
Commentary Ukraine Pentagon Drones Electronic Warfare
Ukraine’s tactical drones are “inflicting roughly two-thirds of Russian losses,” making them “twice as effective as every other weapon in the Ukrainian arsenal,” says a recent study by the Royal United Services Institute. This is a remarkable development for weapons considered relatively unimportant just three years ago—but it exemplifies how Ukraine is changing how the West will fight its wars.
At the risk of oversimplification, wars have always been about managing information, people, and equipment. Stone-age warriors, Napoleon, Patton, and Schwarzkopf all faced these tasks, though certainly on a vastly different scale. Napoleon introduced new ways to control unprecedented quantities of soldiers and materiel, enabling him to operate across distances and against adversaries far more effectively than anyone before him. Decades later, Helmuth von Moltke refined battlefield management by loosening the Napoleonic grip. “War is an art, not a science,” he wrote, acknowledging human judgment in command and control and introducing extensive planning, decentralization, and flexibility. The Prussian leader’s ideas have formed the basis for Western warfare strategy ever since—until the Russo-Ukraine conflict changed everything.
The technological realm has seen similar revolutions. Command and control were transformed by radio, computers, and satellites. Precision munitions gave field commanders the ability to direct “surgical” strikes at much lower costs than their less advanced opponents. During the Cold War, the U.S. military developed frameworks to harness these advances and counter numerically superior Soviet forces. Put to the test in Iraq, the Air-Land Battle concept enabled U.S. forces to dismantle Saddam's substantial military within weeks.
https://www.defenseone.com/ideas/2025/04/how-drones-data-and-ai-transformed-our-militaryand-why-us-must-follow-suit/404444/?oref=d1-homepage-river
