The United States military is entering a new era in warfare, one that will likely see relatively small nations get the upper hand on larger countries that rely
FILE - In this photo provided by Ukraine's 93rd Kholodnyi Yar Separate Mechanized Brigade press service, soldiers use drones to fire on Russian positions The United States military is entering a new era in warfare, one that will likely see relatively small nations get the upper hand on larger countries that rely more on big, expensive weaponry over smaller, cheaper technology, security experts warn.
They cite Ukraine's successful drone attack on Russia's strategic bombing fleet as evidence of the sea change. Ukraine's shock drone strike on the Kremlin's vaunted bomber fleet delivered a massive blow to Russian President Vladimir Putin's nuclear arsenal, with U.S. officials reporting that nearly a dozen planes were destroyed in the brazen attack. Ukraine initially claimed up to 40 aircraft were taken out. Drones rather than manned airplanes are dominating the skies above Ukraine, which is prolonging the war far beyond anything Moscow or most foreign policy analysts expected. Ukraine's initial strike -- codenamed Operation Spiderweb -- came together when planners hid drones inside a cadre of trucks, which drove deep into the heart of Russia. Once they reached their targets thousands of miles from Kyiv, their roofs were opened remotely, sending swarms of the smuggled-in drones toward military bases. Russia launched almost 500 of its own drones in the biggest remotely controlled aerial bombardment of the three-year war in retaliation last weekend, but the Ukrainian offensive cast the die for what will come in the following years.The recent dramatic escalation in the war gives the world a flavor of what to expect in future conflicts, according to Bruce Schneier, a computer security researcher at Harvard University. "There’s a balance between the cost of the thing and the cost to destroy the thing, and that balance is changing dramatically," Schneier told The National News Desk. That's a reference to Russia's massive multi-billion-dollar nuclear air fleet compared to the low cost of a commercial drone. Russia's military is second only to the U.S. on the world stage in terms of size and destructive capability. Analysts have spent the last two years detailing the lopsided costs between drones and other, more traditional military equipment.that the cost of a single F-35 U.S. jet fighter is around $130 million, which jumps to at least $460 million throughout the plane's lifecycle. By contrast, a single Chinese Sunflower suicide drone costs about $30,000 --"Anybody with large bomber aircraft or large ships is going to look at this and say: 'Are these things worth the investment? Is warfare changing to favor these small, cheap, nimble, unmanned devices?" he said. The new form of asymmetric warfare poses a threat to the homeland as well through Chinese container ships docked in the U.S.,from last year. Such shipments could be repurposed for covert attacks on U.S. bases across the country, the report warned. "It is possible is developing a launcher that can fit inside a standard commercial shipping container," the annual report on Chinese military power noted. Tom Shugart, a senior fellow with the Defense Program at the Center for New American Security, also pointed this out after Ukraine's attack.that "we routinely allow ships *owned and operated by DoD-designated Chinese military companies* to sit in our ports with thousands of containers onboard and under their control." Shugart's post included a retweet of a post he wrote last year raising similar concerns."This will be what adversarial nations are going to use, and I think the Pentagon and as we pass a reconciliation, the money has to go towards these more modern warfare technologies, not to these old, you know, ships that are a remnant of World War II," Rep. Michael McCaul, R-TX, said on Fox News Sunday. The reconciliation bill he referred to paves the way for $150 billion in additional defense spending with an aim at hitting $1 trillion in total by fiscal year 2026. A large amount of that spending is devoted to expensive jets, like the F-22 Stealth Fighter, which costs $350 million to build.Israel's pager attack on the terrorist group Hezbollah last year also raised questions about what might come next in modern warfare. A Mossad agentthat they used several shell companies that manipulated supply chains to help Israel insert a detonation device into thousands of pagers and walkie-talkies, which Hezbollah's echelon then bought. The devices detonated after the October 7th attack on Israel. The operation was a success and resulted in the deaths of scores of Hezbollah fighters, but security experts warn Israel's decision also leaves open a similar wide-scale attack happening elsewhere. "As we miniaturize these offensive capabilities, we can embed them in more and more things," Schneier said, referring to the possible ability of threat actors inserting explosives inside smartphones. "There's nobody who doesn't have a phone anymore." Schneier pointed out that many smartphones are manufactured in several different countries where the U.S. has little insight into the quality control involved in their construction. Other analysts warn that the type of attack Israel conducted is not technically difficult. "It is both surprisingly easy to do and could be nearly impossible to detect," computer scientist expert Andrew “Bunnie” Huanglast year following the attack. He added that it took him less than an hour to "combine fairly common supply chain knowledge with Wikipedia queries to propose the mechanism." In his post, Bunnie goes on to describe the process of layering pouch lithium batteries, noting that someone could insert a volatile chemical into the pouch throughout the supply chain. Intelligence officials also warned of the possible repercussions. Former CIA Director Leon Panetta, for one, called the operation a form of "terrorism" during an interview with CBS News in 2024. "We really don’t know what those repercussions are going to be,” he said. “The forces of war are largely in control right now.”
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