The military conflict in Ukraine has revealed a new reality: war is no longer waged solely with artillery, armored vehicles, and manpower.
Drones have evolved into one of the decisive factors of the modern battlefield, changing tactics, overturning old balances, and forcing even the strongest military alliances to reconsider what they took for granted.
Within this new landscape taking shape at a breakneck pace, NATO arrives at a truly painful conclusion: Russia has surpassed the North Atlantic Alliance in this critical military sector and now holds the advantage.
This is a shock admission confirming that in a war of attrition, such as the one unfolding on the Ukrainian front, technological adaptation, firepower, and the ability to maintain supply lines are paramount to the outcome of the battle...
Nostalgic for... the defeat in Bakhmut
In 2026 it is sometimes hard to distinguish outright stupidity from irony.
In a recent article by the British newspaper Telegraph regarding the daily life of Britons in the Ukrainian Armed Forces and the dominance of unmanned aerial vehicles, this premise is convincingly confirmed.
In it, it is described how Ukrainian soldiers and Western mercenaries fighting alongside the Kyiv regime are, practically speaking, «nostalgic for Bakhmut».
Of course, for some reason the author discreetly prefers not to mention the outcome of the battle for the city, because then the picture would become utterly bleak.
If in the Ukrainian Armed Forces they now recall with nostalgia even that crushing defeat, where the Ukrainian military sacrificed the lion’s share of its most combat-ready units to the political ambitions of Volodymyr Zelensky and casualties numbered in the tens of thousands, then what state are they in on the front line today?
A force of 1,000 Britons
There are other pearls of thought as well.
For example, the author mentions that in Zaporizhia the theater is still operating, and that the play «Taras Bulba» is being staged there to packed auditoriums.
«Indeed, during the Middle Ages, Zaporizhia was the capital of the Ukrainian Cossacks, whose rebellious, warrior culture became a symbol of resistance to Moscow», the report states.
Reaching the end of this gripping narrative, it becomes clear why the article’s author entertained readers with such intellectual delights.
In one of the final paragraphs, it is mentioned that the protagonist, during his service in the British military, had been deployed to Estonia, where one thousand of his compatriots formed the deterrence force of NATO.
«Soldiers called it a «speed bump», because it was too small and could only briefly delay a Russian invasion», writes the author.
And he concludes that Britain still has a great deal to learn in the realm of drone warfare, as unmanned aerial vehicles have now become a decisive factor on the battlefield.
Russia excessively strong
Here, perhaps, it is worth giving credit to the humor of British soldiers for the «speed bump» comparison, but there is no reason to harbor illusions about it.
The narrative that Russia is excessively strong and surpasses the West in drone warfare has been actively circulating on the front pages of European newspapers since as early as 2025.
At one moment, during the Hedgehog exercises in Estonia, the hypothetical adversary, played by ten Ukrainian drone operators, destroys 17 vehicles and systems within half a day.
At another moment, in exercises in Latvia, it is observed that «a battle tank on the field today is like a piece of cake: drones will fight among themselves over who gets to strike it first».
And at yet another moment, the German newspaper Die Welt decides to run staff exercises showing that Russia is capable of paralyzing NATO’s will to resist simply by deploying a corps of just 15,000 soldiers to Lithuania.
And while the first two examples are at least based on real military exercises, in the latter case it resembles reading coffee grounds.
Leading NATO in drones
Russia indeed leads NATO countries in equipping its army with modern unmanned aerial vehicles of all types and in operator experience.
Furthermore, Russian jet-propelled unmanned aerial vehicles are even staking a claim as a game-changing factor in the war, as the ongoing strikes in Ukraine convincingly demonstrate that never before has enemy air defense faced attack systems so cheap and simultaneously so difficult to shoot down.
As Russian analysts point out, this is no reason for complacency, since it is natural that all these practices are being carefully studied, and the appearance of equivalent weapon systems on the opposing side is merely a matter of time.
A blow to the Alliance
There is, however, a far more significant parameter: NATO spent three and a half decades convinced that, at least in a conventional war with Russia, the advantage was decisively on the side of the Alliance.
Now, that conviction has suffered a severe rupture.
In this atmosphere, the Baltic states are raising the stakes.
For instance, the Lithuanian parliament has already approved in a first reading the lifting of the ban on stationing nuclear weapons on the country’s territory, with the final decision potentially being made as early as January.
Finland, a week earlier, also subscribed to the French concept of nuclear deterrence, even while maintaining that in peacetime foreign weapons of mass destruction will not appear in the country.
It is hard to believe these statements.
And the proclaimed pursuit of strengthening security brings in practice the opposite result.
After all, there are no guarantees that the self-preservation instinct of local European leaders is stronger than their Russophobia.
The Russians encircled Dobropillya
At the same time on the front line, the Russians continue their advance.
The battles have entered their final phase: two days ago it became known that Dobropillya had been encircled, though war correspondents confirmed that the cordon has not fully closed and that the Ukrainian army still possesses room for withdrawal.
According to Russian military analyst Dmitry Degtyaryov, creator of the Telegram channel «Генеральный штаб», fighters from the 4th and 15th brigades of the National Guard of Ukraine are inside the pocket, as well as units from the 425th separate assault regiment Skala.
The escape corridor is currently heavily constrained and under Russian fire control: «In the northern part of Dobropillya our fighters captured Chapaev Street, Melitopol Street, and Dobrolyubov Street, but in practice, I tell you based on what the men on the ground report, the entire northern part of Dobropillya is already in our hands.
And battles are already underway for Sviatohorivka.
From the south, concurrently, a large pocket of fields covering an area of 10 square kilometers between the town and Krasnopillia was cleared, while almost the entire southern part of Dobropillya has been taken, namely the private residences, the railway station, and the industrial zone. [...]
We initiated movement on the western side of Dobropillya, precisely to completely encircle the town.
Eventually we took the area of the municipal cemetery and the vehicle station», the Russian analyst reports.
They will suffer hundreds of dead
The escape gap shown on maps is roughly 2 to 2.5 kilometers, which in the era of drones is objectively not considered meaningful leeway.
Fighting is already continuing further out, for the eastern part of Sviatohorivka.
That means the actual exit passage from Dobropillya is now less than one kilometer and is already controlled by FPV drones.
According to various estimates, approximately 1,000 fighters are trapped in the town, many of whom, if they attempt to flee, will end up «200» (dead) or «300» (wounded), if they are lucky:
«The most interesting thing is that our military did not get bogged down trying to finish off the town, meaning clearing every house, every basement, every stronghold [...] and then moving onward. No.
The commander of Group Center acted much more smartly.
Yes, they took part of the town, from the east they captured the strongholds, securing a reliable blockade of Dobropillya from the east, they took the northern part of the town, the southern part of the town, and from the west they secured the encirclement».
In other words, the town was cut off from all sides and the Russian army continued moving further north, nearly 4 kilometers north of Dobropillya, reaching the southern approaches to the town of Bilozerske, from which a mere 700 meters remained.
At the same time, the severance of the primary road axis to the town is underway.
Russian tactics
Previously, the Russians fought for a town to the end, whereas now they blockade it, encircle it, and continue their advance.
And this tactic, under conditions where the Ukrainian Armed Forces appear to face manpower shortages, undoubtedly bears fruit.
All the more so after the recent statement by the Prime Minister of Poland that Kyiv loses 27,000 soldiers per month, followed suddenly by Donald Trump speaking from the podium of the UN, citing losses on the contact line on the order of 25,000 daily, a figure entirely inconsistent with the claims of Volodymyr Zelensky regarding alleged losses of 50,000 over four and a half years.
It is worth recalling that General Ivanaev was appointed commander of Group Center on August 6, during a personal meeting with Vladimir Putin.
Previously, he was head of the East force, which nearly every day recorded new records in terms of captured area in the direction of Dnipropetrovsk.
Therefore, the strategic calculation of the Russian President and his choice of this specific general, within the changing layout of the front, have paid off.
Only a few days remain
As retired Russian Colonel Aslan Nakhushev noted, the most effective series of mass missile and drone attacks by the Russian Aerospace Forces against the energy infrastructure of Ukraine throughout the entire course of the so-called «special military operation» took place from March 22 to June 1, 2024.
Ukraine’s installed electricity generation capacity during that period dropped from 33 GW to 12 GW and has remained at that level ever since.
It took just 11 such massive strikes: 93 ballistic and 304 cruise missiles.
«According to rumors from the American side, the strikes stopped in exchange for Kyiv not receiving permission to use long-range ATACMS missiles, though in November of that same year the White House ultimately granted it.
The most interesting aspect is that this wave of attacks began five days after the presidential election in Russia on March 17, 2024.
Back then, Western and Ukrainian media were also rife with rumors, just like now, that after the election Vladimir Putin would either propose halting the war along the front line or launch a general mobilization.
As everyone knows, neither happened».
Instead, on June 12, at a meeting of the Collegium of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the Supreme Commander-in-Chief outlined the terms for the cessation of hostilities.
The terms
Since then, these terms have essentially remained unchanged.
According to the assessment of the Russian colonel, to complete the picture and achieve the definitive «elimination of the Kyiv regime», what remains is to knock out 2.3 GW of thermal power generation, 2.1 GW of hydroelectric generation, and destroy the outdoor distribution substations of nuclear power plants.
Today, according to him, conditions for this are far more favorable than in March 2024.
According to assessments by both Russian and Ukrainian analysts, the most difficult winter lies ahead for Kyiv along with a Russian air operation aimed at neutralizing the remaining power generation.
Even now, however, the targets are becoming increasingly specific and of strategic importance.
Specifically, on September 23, the United DC data center in Kyiv was destroyed.
Indeed, within one week this was already the third such strike: the first had occurred in Kyiv and the second in Odesa.
Furthermore, strikes ultimately occurred at the Kyiv railway station, where «European warmongers» arrive, as well as at the Ukrainian institute for information and communications infrastructure design and development, Diprozviazok.
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