And the enemy is using the exact same thing against you. Yet infantry will remain critical for claiming territory, clearing areas and more. As drones advance, war will probably become even bloodier. And drone operators that survive are already coming home completely broken men suffering from extreme PTSD.
Then factor on top of this logistics. You need to transport men, keep them fed, equipped, and more. You need to move a massive amount of stuff constantly in war, yet drones are going to be buzzing everywhere. So I think we're seeing the future of war now - slow, grueling, bloody wars of attrition.
And war where high prices tags are replaced by high costs in stuff, making it more apparent than ever that economies maximized through financial games and services are paper tigers when facing economies based on the production of tangible things.
I don't think they are, actually (using the same TTPs), nor would it make sense to.
Ukrainian drone doctrine is very different than Russian, and not just on paper, but how it is playing out.
This is for two main reasons: proximity to logistics for the defenders vs attackers, and existing military structures including vehicles and troop organizational structures (MTOE) that drone systems support or are supported by.
So I don't agree with your assessment there. It doesn't seem to match what's happening in the field with the type of drones used and the percentage of the classification of each type of drone system and purpose. These are quite different.
I also don't think it will be more bloody, but less over time. Much of the fight is in the electronic warfare arena and in air dominance across the vertical airspace. A colleague agrees:
Infantry are expensive to train correctly, to outfit, and supply. I think the total number of frontline combat troops will continue to go down as a fraction of overall troops, while increasing supporting positions for drones, communications, electronic warfare, and general battlefield logistics.
That article reads like typical NATO stuff which sounds great in practice but makes assumptions that don't exist, and are unobtainable (like air superiority), if you're fighting an enemy more sophisticated than guys running around in sandals with AKs. Here [1] is a report from somebody who worked with drones in Ukraine, and why he's exceptionally disillusioned with them.
I half wonder if what I linked to wasn't an indirect response to what you posted, as it was published only 3 days later, and is essentially that article's equal but opposite.
Then factor on top of this logistics. You need to transport men, keep them fed, equipped, and more. You need to move a massive amount of stuff constantly in war, yet drones are going to be buzzing everywhere. So I think we're seeing the future of war now - slow, grueling, bloody wars of attrition.
And war where high prices tags are replaced by high costs in stuff, making it more apparent than ever that economies maximized through financial games and services are paper tigers when facing economies based on the production of tangible things.