From Ukraine to the Middle East: how drones and AI are rewriting the rules of modern warfare

The Conversation | Marcus Schulzke

Ukraine faces severe military vulnerabilities following the American disruption of Starshield, the military version of Starlink. Modern technology enables smaller states and sub-states to challenge dominant military powers. Soviet Union theorists in the 1970s identified early shifts in precision weapons, a concept reinforced by the 1991 Gulf War.

Warfare remains fundamentally human, and technology only temporarily upsets the balance of power before opponents acquire countermeasures. Ukraine uses drones to overcome numeric and artillery limitations, with unmanned systems even capturing Russian positions without infantry. Meanwhile, the Houthi paramilitary organization employs drones and missiles to disrupt Saudi oil trade and airspace. The Houthi also utilize Anthropic’s Claude AI to improve weapons guidance systems. Terrorist organizations deploy generative AI for recruitment, explosives preparation, and attack coordination. Protracted conflicts will persist as smaller entities maximize these technologies.

Comment

The integration of commercial large language models into targeting cycles shifts precision strike capabilities away from state monopolies. When non-state actors apply models like Anthropic's Claude to missile guidance, the software replaces institutional engineering corps. This lowers the technical barrier for ballistic and cruise munitions adjustments. Consequently, air defence architectures face compressed sensor-to-shooter timelines regardless of the adversary's formal industrial capacity.

Historical precedents from irregular warfare show that asymmetric actors consistently adopt commercial dual-use innovations faster than bureaucratic procurement systems can restrict them. The emergence of autonomous drone teams capturing positions without infantry support mirrors earlier shifts in decentralised mine warfare and improvised explosive device networking. This institutional agility prevents dominant powers from establishing durable technological overmatch through traditional hardware superiority alone.

Strategic Question for Discussion

What happens to established integrated air defence networks when off-the-shelf generative AI models effectively bypass traditional ballistic guidance development cycles?

The pattern suggests that traditional missile defense architectures will struggle to maintain cost-per-intercept parity as automated guidance iterations outpace hardware upgrades. This points to a permanent degradation of state-backed technological monopolies in precision strike warfare.

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