Ukraine

Ukraine no longer wants to send soldiers to the front. His answer is an “unpublished Frankenstein”: robot-tanks with machine guns

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The British inventor Ernest Swinton first proposed using “land ships” to cross trenches and avoid sending infantry directly into fire. That idea gave rise to first modern tank a year later. Now, more than a century later, the logic is the same again: find a machine that can go where a soldier no longer can. A front that is too deadly. The war in Ukraine has entered a point where the simple act of sending men towards the line of contact begins to be too expensive a luxury. The saturation of drones has turned wide swaths of the front into real death zones where any movement is detected and punished almost instantly. This has changed the logic of the battle because it is no longer just about who has more armor or more artillery, but about who can continue hitting without exposing bodies. And here Ukraine is beginning to embrace a radical idea: if the front devours soldiers, perhaps the time has come to stop sending soldiers. The birth of a new “Frankenstein”. The Ukrainian response is as pragmatic as it is disturbing: take weapons systems designed for fixed positions and assemble them about ground robots. In fact, companies like Frontline Robotics They have converted their turret autonomous Buria (a kind of metal arm capable of firing machine guns or grenade launchers) into something new: small armed unmanned vehicles that act as micro-tanks. They are not tanks in the classic sense, but they fulfill part of their function. They move, shoot, seek cover and attack without a human being inside. It is a kind of improvised hybrid, a creature assembled with different parts to survive a battlefield that no longer forgives. The war against Russian infiltrations. The immediate objective of these robots is not major offensives, but something much more specific: hunt small groups of Russian infiltration. Moscow has been exploiting a simple but effective tactic for months: send small teams of infantry that slip between lines, forests and trenches to avoid aerial surveillance and penetrate Ukrainian defenses. They are small movements, difficult to detect and cheap to execute. Ukraine has understood that responding by sending more infantry only feeds that crusher. So now he sends armed robots, controlled from dozens of kilometers away, to intercept them before they go deeper into the line. The classic tank is getting old. There is a compelling reason why this idea is gaining traction: traditional tanks They are suffering greatly. Both Ukraine and Russia have discovered that a multi-million euro armored vehicle can be destroyed by a cheap drone in a matter of minutes. The economic equation has been broken. In that context, an armed terrestrial robot is a brutally logical solution: it costs less, it is manufactured faster and if it is destroyed no one dies. It is a mutation of the armored concept. Less armor, less power, less glamour… but more expendable. And in an industrial war, the expendable is often more valuable than the perfect. Evolution at the speed of war. The most striking thing is the speed with which all this evolves. Frontline Robotics It ensures that it introduces small changes up to twenty times a month and major updates every six months. The battlefield works like real time laboratory. Soldiers send constant feedback, and companies adapt their machines almost on the fly. It is a brutal advantage compared to the bureaucratic slowness of many Western industries. What today is a robot with a machine gunwithin a few months it may be a much more sophisticated system. Put another way, Ukraine is learning faster because it has no choice. Defend without humans. The underlying idea is more than a simple tactical innovation. Ukraine has already used ground robots to evacuate woundedcarry supplies, place mines and clear routes. This year they have made more than 50,000 missionsa gigantic jump compared to just 2,000 the previous semester. But what is truly new is the offensive leap: Russian positions captured only with aerial drones and ground robots, without a single infantry entering first. There has even been surrenders to machines. This paints a disturbing future: entire sectors defended and attacked by unmanned systems, where humans are increasingly distant from the point of impact. The ground war is mutating. What Ukraine is doing with these robot tanks may seem improvised, even almost artisanal, but it contains a transformation a lot more fat. For centuries, conquering land meant sending men into fire. Now start mean send machines. Not because they are better at everything, but because they are sacrificial. And on a front where every meter costs blood, the priority is no longer to advance bravely, but rather preserve lives. For this reason, Ukraine is not simply building new robots: it is testing a new way of waging ground warfare where the soldier is no longer the first piece to move. Image | Frontline Robotics, Oleksandr Klymenko/Ukrinform In Xataka | Satellite images revealed that Russia covered a building with an anti-drone cage. Ukraine turned it into an action movie set In Xataka | The drone war in Ukraine just solved an old military obsession: how to blow up a bridge without tons of bombs

Satellite images revealed that Russia covered a building with an anti-drone cage. Ukraine turned it into an action movie set

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In World War II, the United Kingdom became camouflage entire factories with nets, fake structures and even fictitious neighborhoods built on rooftops to fool German bombers. The idea it was simple– If you can’t stop the attack, make the target disappear from the air. Eight decades later, that logic has returned. Only now the enemy is no longer looking from a bomber, but from a drone. The giant cage. Satellite images made it clear: Russia had done something that until recently seemed unthinkable, wrapping an entire building in a gigantic anti-drone structure. We are not talking about a tank or an armored vehicle, where “cope cages” are already common, but rather about a strategic factory more than 900 kilometers from the front. The facility, part of the VNIIR Progress plant in Cheboksary, had been protected with that kind of metal skeleton for at least a year. Was the test of the extent to which Moscow assumes that Ukraine can strike very deep inside Russia. But it was also a silent admission: the drone threat has already changed even the industrial architecture of warfare. Shield the rear. VNIIR Progress is not just any factory. Produces essential navigation components for a good part of the Russian arsenal: Shahed-136 type drones, Kalibr cruise missiles, Iskander ballistic missiles and gliding bombs. It is, in essence, a critical piece of the Russian military gear. Protecting it with a cage of that size reveals something important: it is no longer enough to move factories away from the front. Russian strategic depth has been eroded and the war has meant that once safe places now need permanent physical defenses. Ukraine changed the rules (again). The problem for Russia is that Ukraine no longer only strikes with drones. In the most recent attack, kyiv used its new cruise missiles FP-5 Flamingoa nationally manufactured weapon with more than 2,800 kilometers of range and an explosive warhead weighing more than one ton. That detail completely changes the equation. The anti-drone cage could make sense against small kamikaze drones or light munitions. But faced with a missile of that size, the structure becomes practically in decoration. Ukraine, in essence, demonstrated that the Russian solution was designed for yesterday’s war. What the defense gives away. The most interesting thing is not only the damage caused, but what it means the very existence of that cage. Every new anti-drone net, mesh or cover that appears over Russian refineries, air bases or factories is a sign of vulnerability. For decades, the industrial rearguard was a sanctuary. Now Russia is spending resources to fortify even its production centers. In other words, what you see is a clear symptom that the Ukrainian deep strike campaign is working at least on a psychological and operational level, forcing Moscow to redistribute protection and assume additional costs. The invisible climb. The episode also reflects a broader evolution: the industrial war is becoming a war constant adaptation. Ukraine began using long-range drones to overwhelm defenses and hit critical infrastructure. Russia, like we have been countingresponded with networks, interference and physical structures. Now kyiv goes up a notch with missiles heavier and more precise. Each defensive layer generates a higher offensive layer. And that turns the conflict into a technological race where no solution lasts too long. The lesson of the attack. The image is very powerful because summarizes all the logic of modern warfare: an entire building wrapped in steel to protect electronic parts that then guide precision weapons… and still reached. The conclusion is inevitably uncomfortable for Moscow. If a facility hundreds of miles from the front needs a giant cage and not even that guarantees your safetythen the real frontier of war is no longer in the trenches. It is anywhere on the map where the military industry continues to function. Image | Ventor In Xataka | Ukraine has found Russia’s weak point in Crimea. And now there is a line of Russian trucks that cannot move forward In Xataka | The drone war has left a clear lesson for Ukraine: you can’t leave home without a 100-year-old machine gun

Satellites show where Russia is heading in Europe after Ukraine

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In the midst of the Cold War, Norway was the only NATO country with a direct border with the Soviet Union in the Arctic, and for decades the alliance rehearsed there how stop a Soviet invasion in extreme snow and ice conditions. That old frozen border seemed like a relic of the 20th century. Today it is once again one of the most guarded areas in Europe. Russia fights while preparing the north. They counted the TWZ analysts that, while Russia remains bogged down in the Ukrainian war, wasting men, armor and resources in a conflict that has already transformed its entire economy, at the same time it is building something much further north. The new satellite images together with intelligence analysis show that Moscow has been expanding bases, building barracks and creating new logistical warehouses next to the border with Finland and Norway for months. The most disturbing fact is the scale: facilities prepared to house up to 80,000 soldiers. The reading is clear. Although Ukraine continues to absorb a good part of its military force, the Kremlin is already designing the next scenario of tension with the West. “New satellite images show that Russia is increasing its weapons in the area,” the report states. “SVT, together with media partners in several countries, has analyzed how Russia is preparing for the deployment of 80,000 troops… It is a threat we must take seriously,” declares Thomas Nilsson, head of the Swedish military intelligence service (MUST). Russia is expanding its military infrastructure near the borders of NATO countries. Satellite images show numerous new barracks capable of housing thousands of troops, as well as ammunition depots and equipment storage areas From a discrete border to a reinforced one. For years, the border between Russia and Finland was one of the most stable areas in northern Europe. There was a military presenceyes, but at relatively low volumes and without a great sense of immediate threat. Now that is starting to change. According to the finnish estimatesMoscow could go from about 20,000 troops to almost 100,000 once the new facilities are completed. that jump multiplies the capacity of Russian pressure in the area and completely alters the military balance of the region. It is no longer a surveillance presence; It is a structure designed to sustain a massive concentration of troops. Russia is expanding its military infrastructure near the borders of NATO countries. Satellite images show numerous new barracks capable of housing thousands of troops, as well as ammunition depots and equipment storage areas The Arctic is no longer a periphery. All this has a profound reason: the Arctic has ceased to be a distant corner and has become a centerpiece of the world board. The melting ice is opening sea routes that were previously impassable, the region’s energy reserves are enormous and control of the north offers decisive military advantages. Russia has been understanding this for years and strengthening his position. China has also shown more and more interest. What once seemed like marginal geography is now a space where top-level economic, military and strategic interests intersect. Russia is expanding its military infrastructure near the borders of NATO countries. Satellite images show numerous new barracks capable of housing thousands of troops, as well as ammunition depots and equipment storage areas NATO responds. NATO’s reaction it has been fast. The alliance has activated a new advanced ground force in Finland, supported mainly by Sweden and with command and deployment centers spread across northern Scandinavia. Although the initial number of soldiers is small compared to what Russia is preparing, the political message is powerful. Finland and Sweden have gone from neutrality to becoming in central pieces of European defense. In other words, the north is no longer a calm rearguard and is beginning to resemble a new line of contact. The real fear after Ukraine. What worries NATO most is not what Russia can do now, because a good part of its army remains committed in Ukraine. The real concern is in what comes next. If the conflict freezes or ends and Moscow decides to move part of its veteran units to the north, all that infrastructure could fill up in a very short time. That means that what today seems like a medium-term preparation could quickly transform into a tangible threat. The current war, in that sense, is also a period of transition towards something broader. Europe looks to the north with different eyes. It is the most obvious conclusion: the rivalry between Russia and the West is no longer limited to the Ukrainian front. Everything indicates that is expanding towards new areas where the clash is not yet open, but where everyone is preparing as if it could arrive. Moscow strengthens positions, NATO reorganizes his defense and United States adapts its military structure to the new map of the Arctic. There is no doubt, we are not talking about shots fired on that border, but we are talking about movements, investments and deployments that reveal the same idea. As Russia continues to fight one war, satellites indicate that it is preparing the next one. Image | x In Xataka | As we look to the Middle East, the Arctic has become the hiding place for Russia’s biggest challenge to NATO: Borei and Yasen In Xataka | While we all look at Iran, something is moving in the Arctic Circle: Russia is sending bombers with missiles

Ukraine has found Russia’s weak point in Crimea. And now there is a line of Russian trucks that cannot move forward

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During World War II, General George S. Patton It stopped its advance not because of a lack of tanks or ammunition, but because of something much more basic: gasoline. Their armored columns consumed so much fuel that logistics could not keep up. Since then, armies learned a brutally simple lesson: sometimes war is decided not by who fires the most, but by who keeps the tank full. The real Achilles heel. For months, the war in Crimea had been told in terms of missiles, air bases and attacks on the Black Sea Fleet. But Ukraine seems to have identified something much more vulnerable, the same thing we just saw with the US agreement with Iran to end the war: the fuel. It is not just about destroying military objectives, but about attacking the “blood” that makes the entire Russian machine work. Without gasoline, trucks do not move, projectiles do not arrive, drones do not fly, nor an offensive is sustained. And that’s exactly what kyiv is cutting. Hit the artery. I was counting this morning the financial times that the Ukrainian campaign has concentrated on the land corridor connecting continental Russia with Crimea, especially the “Novorossiya” highwaythe great logistics work inaugurated in 2023 and presented by Vladimir Putin as one of the great strategic successes of the war. It we counted recently. That road connects Rostov with the peninsula through occupied Mariupol and Melitopol, and has now become a shooting gallery: more than 375 documented attacks against trucks and vehicles since May, many of them precisely on that road. The message is clear: there is no need to destroy Crimea, enough is enough with disconnecting it. A peninsula that lives off what it enters. The problem for Moscow It is structural. Crimea neither produces oil nor has enough refining capacity to sustain itself. It has always depended on external supplies, before from Ukraine and now from Russia. This dependency turns each destroyed convoy into an immediate problem. The images of kilometric queuesdigital coupons and rationing at gas stations in Sevastopol show how the logistical impact translates almost instantly into social pressure. What at the front is a supply interruption, in the rear already seems like a siege. The Kerch bridge is no longer enough. For a long time, the bridge was the great russian lifeguard. But since the 2022 attack that damaged its stretches and set a fuel train on fire, Moscow has greatly reduced its use for sensitive shipments. Transporting fuel by road is much less efficient than by train, because a single rail convoy is equivalent to dozens and dozens of tanker trucks. And therein lies the problem: Ukraine is hitting both systems at the same time, forcing Russia to improvise floating bridges and much slower and more vulnerable secondary routes. The intermediate drone war. The most interesting thing is that this campaign is not being led by either small front-line drones or large strategic drones, but rather a new intermediate category that we have been explaining. We talk about systems like the FP-2, Behemoth or the Hornet that allow you to attack at distances of up to 200 kilometers with enough charge to destroy trucks, warehouses and bridges. They are cheap devices, difficult to intercept and operate with networks like Starlink that complicate Russian electronic warfare. It’s a major change, as Ukraine is turning logistics into its own front. Crimea is an island again. If you like, the great effect of this strategy It is psychological and military both. Crimea was conquered by Russia as a platform to project power, and now it is beginning to look an isolated enclave which needs to be fed daily to survive. If Ukraine keeps up the pace through the summer, the pressure will not only be on the southern front, but at full capacity Russian to sustain operations in the region. And there is the central idea: Moscow still has missiles, bases and soldiers in Crimea, but Ukraine has understood that the weak point was not so much in destroying them directly, it was in simply leaving them without gasoline. Image | Britannia In Xataka | We have to start thinking about the Ukrainian war in terms greater than those of the First World War. In Xataka | The drone war has left a clear lesson for Ukraine: you can’t leave home without a 100-year-old machine gun

Russia thought kyiv would fall within days. Four years later, the war in Ukraine has just “passed” the First World War

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In 1914, millions of Europeans they were convinced that the war would end before Christmas. In fact, the expression “home by Christmas” became popular between soldiers and civilians who believed that the conflict would be rather brief. It ended up lasting more than four years and transforming Europe forever. More than a century later, the Ukrainian war has already grown longer. From days to historical milestone. When Russia launched its full-scale invasion in February 2022, the Kremlin expected a swift campaign that would culminate in the fall of kyiv within days. More than four years later, the reality is exactly the opposite: the war has reached the 1,569 days duration and has already officially surpassed to the First World War. What began as an operation designed to quickly overthrow the Ukrainian government has transformed into one of the longest and most consequential conflicts in recent European history, to the point that many Ukrainians they contemplate with concern another historical threshold even more distant: the duration of the Second World War. The inevitable comparison with 1914. The historians warn that comparisons with world wars have obvious limits due to the differences in scale, number of countries involved and volume of casualties. However, they consider that the war in Ukraine shares enough features with the First World War to become its closest parallel in more than a century. Both began lightning offensives aimed at achieving a decisive victory within a few weeks. Both the German advance to Paris in 1914 like the Russian push towards kyiv in 2022 came close to achieving their initial objectives before being stopped and forced to retreat. The return of trench warfare. After the failure of the initial offensives, both conflicts drifted towards long static fronts where artillery dominated the battlefield. The images from the trenches of eastern Ukraine quickly evoked scenes from France and Belgium during the Great War. Soldiers barely separated a few hundred meterscontinuous bombardments and small infantry assaults became the daily routine. The firepower forced combatants to bury themselves underground to survive, reproducing a pattern that seemed to belong definitively to the past. Drones change the rules. The main difference between both wars came from the air. The drones profoundly transformed the battlefield and ended up making even traditional trenches vulnerable. Permanent surveillance from the sky and the ability to attack with precision forced the replacement of long defensive lines by small scattered sheltersdifficult to detect and more resistant to attacks. In many areas, any open-air movement can be located and attacked in a matter of minutes, turning large areas of the front into veritable death zones controlled by unmanned systems. Tanks, bunkers and dispersal. Technological evolution has also reduced the prominence of some weapons that for decades symbolized modern warfare. Tanks, feared during the early stages of the invasion, have become on easy targets for drones and they appear less and less near the line of contact. Meanwhile, soldiers invest enormous efforts in building shelters each time more sophisticated and profound. Some bunkers incorporate specific designs to absorb explosions and increase the chances of survival, reflecting the extent to which physical protection is once again a vital issue in an attritional conflict. Destruction reminiscent of the last century. Although the casualty figures They are very inferior Like those of the First World War, the visual devastation is eerily familiar. Destroyed forests, towns reduced to ruins and fields covered in craters constantly appear in images captured by reconnaissance drones. Various military analysts hold that the lethality of the Ukrainian front is close to that of the great battles of a century ago, not because of the absolute number of deaths but because of the constant danger faced by those fighting on the front lines. Stagnation and the search for a way out. The slow pace of progress illustrates the nature of the conflict. In some recent operations, Russian forces have progressed at a pace even slower than that recorded in some of the most stagnant battles of the First World War. With negotiations practically paralyzed, neither side has yet found a formula to break the balance. Ukraine tries to weaken Russian economic capacity through attacks against energy infrastructures and oil companies while flooding the front with thousands of attack drones, seeking to impose unsustainable costs on the adversary. The final paradox is that a war that began with the promise of quick victory increasingly looks like to the Great War: a prolonged struggle of attrition, marked by technology and with no clear end in sight. Image | Ministry of Defense of Ukraine In Xataka | The drone war has left a clear lesson for Ukraine: you can’t leave home without a 100-year-old machine gun In Xataka | In case there was not enough “gasoline” in 2026, the attack by a Russian drone has crossed a red line: that of Chernobyl

Ukraine turned drones into hunters. A helicopter shot down in Hormuz has transformed them into a Spielberg film

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In April 1944, a small Sikorsky YR-4 helicopter went behind Japanese lines in Burma to rescue four soldiers isolated. That operation is considered the first military combat rescue carried out by a helicopter and opened a new era in the recovery of personnel under enemy fire. More than 80 years later, another innovation has just taken an equally transcendent step. Apache shot down at the most delicate moment. The fragile truce between the United States and Iran was brought to the brink of collapse when a US AH-64 Apache attack helicopter fell into nearby waters to the Strait of Hormuz during a patrol mission. Trump claimed that the aircraft had been shot down by Iran and promised a military responsewhile different American sources suggested that the impact would have been caused by an Iranian drone, possibly a Shahed. Although it remains completely unclear whether the attack was deliberate or accidental, the incident had a huge symbolic load because it occurred in one of the most sensitive points on the planet, through which a fifth of the world’s oil transits and where Washington and Iran have been facing each other for months in a war of attrition marked by naval blockades, air attacks and constant episodes of tension. Ah64 The immediate response. The political reaction was almost as rapid as the incident itself. trump publicly declared that the United States had to respond to the shootdown and a few hours later the US Central Command announced retaliatory attacks against Iranian targets. Although operations seemed to remain within from a limited framework to avoid a new generalized escalation, the episode demonstrated the extent to which the ceasefire remained extremely fragile. The statements of Iranian officialscombining references to diplomacy with veiled warnings, made clear that both sides were trying to avoid outright war while continuing to send messages of strength to each other on the ground. The real event. However, the most relevant thing about the entire sequence was not the fall of the Apache or the subsequent retaliation. The truly revolutionary thing happened when the two surviving crew members were rescued. For decades, combat search and rescue operations have depended on helicopters, specialized aircraft and human teams that had to enter extremely dangerous areas to recover downed pilots. In Ukraine we have seen drones attacking, watching, taking prisoners, guiding artillerytransporting supplies and even intercepting other dronesbut the conflict between the United States and Iran has just shown something different: for the first time an autonomous naval drone He recovered two soldiers in the water and brought them to safety. It is an advance that until very recently seemed like something out of a science fiction movie and that marks a conceptual leap as important as the one represented by the arrival of the first combat drones. The Corsair and the birth of a new mission. They remembered the TWZ analysts that the protagonist of this operation was the corsairan unmanned vessel developed by the Saronic company and operated by Task Force 59 of the US Navy. Measuring 7 meters in length, capable of sailing more than 1,800 kilometers and with a high level of autonomy, the system located the two pilots, picked them up at sea and moved them to a safe area where they were later evacuated by helicopter. What is really new is that the Corsair was not initially conceived for rescues, but for maritime surveillancerecognition and tracking of vessels. The incident has shown that these systems can take on much more complex and delicate tasks, becoming a kind of first step in rescue capable of penetrating areas that are too dangerous for manned platforms. Lesson learned after years of high-risk rescues. The US military has been concerned for years about the vulnerability of its search and rescue units. Previous operations, such as pilot recovery shot down inside Iran or rescue missions in heavily defended scenarios, forced helicopters, planes and specialized personnel to be exposed to enormous risks. He use of the Corsair offers a completely new alternative. Instead of immediately sending a manned aircraft to an area threatened by missiles, drones or anti-aircraft defenses, an autonomous vehicle can arrive first, secure survivors and transport them to a point where other means operate more safely. It is a solution that reduces human risks and greatly expands the possibilities of action in future high-intensity conflicts. From the Strait of Hormuz to the Pacific. The implications go far beyond the Gulf of Oman. The US Navy already imagines networks of autonomous vessels distributed over entire regionsespecially in the Pacific, capable of monitoring sea routes, detecting threats, supporting military operations and, if necessary, rescuing downed or shipwrecked pilots. The concept is reminiscent of a network of mobile emergency stations spread over huge ocean areas. The Apache experience shows that these systems are no longer simple floating sensors or surveillance platforms, but rather operational actors capable of intervening directly in critical situations. The next silent revolution. The Ukrainian war turned drones in absolute protagonists of the modern battlefield and transformed the way we understand ground combat. However, the Apache episode points towards a new evolution. The great advance no longer consists only of using drones to destroy targets, but in trusting them with missions traditionally reserved for human beings. The rescue of the two American pilots represents the first known example of a personnel recovery executed by an autonomous vessel in a real military environment. It may seem like a minor detail compared to missiles, airstrikes or strategic retaliation, but it will probably be remembered as one of those discrete moments that herald a much more profound transformation: the moment when drones stopped being just weapons or hunters and also became rescuers. Image | US Navy In Xataka | The US had a ship with 2,000 marines ready to invade Iran. Now he has sent it right to the place where China worries the most In Xataka | In Lebanon, the war is becoming difficult to explain: drones to take over a 1,000-year-old … Read more

Ukraine has turned military bridges into impossible targets. Russia just responded with a Frankenstein on wheels

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In World War II, six soldiers could carry parts by hand of a Bailey bridge and build a passage for tanks in a matter of hours. Eight decades later, the real challenge is no longer building the bridge: it is making it survive long enough to enter service. River crossings are a nightmare. Crossing a river has always been one of the most delicate operations for any army. Crossing points are predictable, vehicles must be concentrated in a small space, and engineers need time to deploy bridges or pontoons. In Ukraine, however, the problem has become a new dimension. Drones constantly monitor roads, accesses and banks, detecting any preparation for a crossing long before it occurs. This means that forces attempting to cross a river can be attacked even before reaching the water. What for decades was a complex engineering operation has been transformed into a race against time under permanent surveillance. A problem since the start of the war. Russian difficulties in crossing rivers they are not new. One of the most remembered episodes occurred in May 2022, when a Russian tactical group was practically destroyed during an attempt to cross the Siverski Donets. More than three years later, the problem remains unresolved. They remembered in Forbes That even relatively modest obstacles like the Vovcha River can slow down entire operations because the challenge is no longer just overcoming the water, but surviving the deployment process. Every bridge, every pontoon and every engineering vehicle automatically becomes a priority target for Ukrainian drones, artillery and other precision strike systems. The strange “Frankenstein”. Thus a scene has taken place that has remained recorded on video by Ukrainian forces. It happened when one of the most peculiar vehicles seen in the war appeared. A Russian unit built an improvised system using military truck chassis, probably Ural or KamAZ, transformed into a kind of articulated pontoon. The structure was made up of a drive section and a large adapted trailer, creating a set long enough to cross narrow sections of the river. Its appearance was so rudimentary and strange that Ukrainian observers compared it to a creation straight out of a Mad Max movie and they baptized as a four-wheeled “Frankenstein”. More than a visual curiosity, the vehicle reflected the need to find alternative solutions to a problem for which conventional means seem increasingly less effective. A mission observed from start to finish. The broadcast images by the Ukrainian Wolfhound unit show the complete route of the vehicle towards its objective. The group advanced at high speed through Vovchansk in an obvious attempt to reduce the time of exposure to possible attacks. During the trip, the trailer repeatedly left the road, knocked down an electrical pole and activated several mines without being disabled. Even so he managed to reach the river bank. However, Ukrainian air surveillance had followed their every move. As the soldiers began to deploy the system and the forward section began entering the water, several attack drones They destroyed the vehicle before he could complete his mission. A deeper problem. The most striking thing about the episode is that Russia has specialized teams capable of carrying out this type of operations. Systems such as launchable bridges MTU-72 or the PMP pontoons They were designed precisely to allow the passage of troops and armor through rivers much larger than the Vovcha. For a unit to resort to a such an improvised solution suggests that these means were not available in that sector or that the losses accumulated during the war have reduced their presence on the front line. It also reflects an industrial reality: the current priority is on producing tanks, armored vehicles, drones, ammunition and artillery, while engineering equipment receives much less attention and replenishment. Modern warfare forces us to reinvent everything. He “Frankenstein” by Vovchansk fits into an increasingly visible trend within the Russian military. In recent years, protected armored vehicles have appeared with anti-drone cagesvehicles covered with netsmodified robots for new features and all types of adaptations carried out directly by combat units. The speed at which threats evolve often outpaces militaries’ ability to develop and deploy new solutions. Although the makeshift pontoon was destroyed, its existence is revealing. It demonstrates the extent to which drones have disrupted a military task as basic as crossing a river, and how soldiers are attempting to fill the gap between battlefield needs and the ability of military machinery to respond with ingenuity, recycled parts, and emergency solutions. Image | x In Xataka | Russia’s enemy in Ukraine is basically an AI. So you’re painting your tanks CAPTCHA color In Xataka | Thousands of elderly Ukrainians are isolated at the front. An army of drones is coming to your rescue

Russia shielded its logistics routes against drones. Ukraine has responded by attacking something much more vulnerable: asphalt

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In the spring of 1945, the United States launched a campaign called Operation Starvation. Instead of concentrating on destroying Japanese ships one by one, he began laying mines in the straits and sea routes through which they had to pass. The result It was so effective that dozens of convoy routes had to be abandoned and Japanese maritime traffic plummeted, making logistics as valuable a target as the vehicles themselves. From trucks to roads. The logistics war between Russia and Ukraine is entering in a new phase. For months, Ukraine concentrated its efforts in destroying trucksconvoys, fuel depots and other targets that kept the Russian army supplied. Moscow responded by strengthening the protection of its supply routes, deploying anti-aircraft defenses, adapting its movements and building corridors that were increasingly protected against drones. Now kyiv appears to have identified a vulnerability that is more difficult to fix: the infrastructure itself on which those supplies circulate. Instead of only pursuing specific vehicles, Ukrainian drones are beginning to lay mines on the roads that connect Crimea with the occupied territories, transforming essential routes for Russian logistics into spaces where any movement can become a risk. The strategy of the logistical blockade. Ukrainian authorities describe this campaign as an attempt to impose a “logistical blockade” on the Russian military. The goal is not necessarily to completely cut off communications or destroy every vehicle that passes through them. The key is slow down movement of supplies, increase uncertainty and force the enemy to dedicate increasing resources to protection and cleanup tasks. If a convoy must constantly stop to inspect the road, if each journey requires additional escorts, or if a route remains closed for hours after the appearance of a mine, the cumulative effect can be as damaging as the direct destruction of vehicles. Modern warfare depends on both the speed and the volume of supplies, and any reduction in the pace of movement has a direct impact on units deployed on the front. Roads to Crimea under pressure. Information from Russian sources they point because the campaign is focusing especially on the land corridor that connects Russia with Crimea through the occupied territories of southern Ukraine. Roads such as the M-14 between Mariupol, Melitopol and Chongar or the R-280 Novorossiya have suffered partial closures, traffic restrictions and damage caused by mines dropped from drones. In one of the most notable incidentsa Kamaz truck was reportedly destroyed and several vehicles damaged after mines fell on a road near the border between the occupied regions of Kherson and Zaporizhzhia. These episodes also occur after a series of attacks against tankers and convoys that had already forced Russian authorities to modify routes and temporarily limit heavy traffic. Drones that turn asphalt into a trap. The novelty does not lie in the use of mines, a practice that has been present for decades in any conflict, but in the way they are deployed. According to various analystsUkraine is using drones to distribute 3D printed light mines equipped with motion sensors or magnetic systems. These charges do not need to completely destroy a vehicle to be effective. Enough with immobilizing a truck in the middle of a road to create traffic jams, disrupt traffic and create a concentration of targets vulnerable to subsequent air attacks. A single mine can stop a whole column. Several mines spread periodically along a route can paralyze traffic for hours while inspections and clearance operations are carried out. The creation of interdiction zones. The tactic is part of a broader concept that seeks to turn Russian logistics routes into true layered interdiction zones. Drivers traveling these roads must already face ambush FPV dronesautonomous drones assisted by artificial intelligence and attacks directed against the anti-aircraft defenses that protect the logistics corridors. The incorporation of air-dropped mines adds a permanent threat under the wheels of every vehicle. The result is a combination of risks that multiplies the psychological and operational pressure on any movement of supplies, forcing Russia to simultaneously monitor the sky, the roadsides and the asphalt surface itself. The Russian adaptation. The Russian response is already beginning to be seen in some sectors of the front. Ukrainian sources claim to have destroyed Tor-M2 anti-aircraft systems that were being moved to reinforce the protection of these vulnerable routes. At the same time, some analysts believe that Moscow could try extend to roads further from the front the anti-drone network and tunnel structures that it already uses in closer combat zones. However, they remembered in Forbes that protecting hundreds of kilometers of open roads represents a logistical and economic challenge much greater than that of shielding some sections close to the battle lines. Precisely therein lies the logic of the Ukrainian strategy: the more extensive the infrastructure that must be protected, the more difficult it will be to guarantee its security. Crimea as an indirect objective. The pressure on the roads also has a strategic dimension related to Crimea. Ukraine has been attacking anti-aircraft systems, radars, missile launchers and other assets that protect the peninsula for months. If land routes supplying the region become slower and more dangerous, Russia could be forced to rely even more from the Kerch bridgeone of the few high-capacity logistics arteries that continue to directly connect Crimea with Russian territory. This would increase the importance of an infrastructure that has already been a priority objective of kyiv on repeated occasions. Keep a road open to make it useless. In short, the great innovation of this campaign is that it does not necessarily seek to permanently cut a route. Ukraine seems to be pursuing something more subtle: keeping the roads technically open while progressively reducing its usefulness. If each convoy requires more time, if each inspection causes delays and if each stop increases exposure to new attacks, the logistics flow is degraded without the need to destroy the infrastructure. Russia has dedicated enormous efforts to protecting its convoys and supply corridors from drones. The Ukrainian response now consists of moving the … Read more

Ukraine has been left without thousands of drones. An error classified them as electric cars, and the Treasury has fried them with taxes

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During World War II, the United States Army created entire systems classification and emergency purchases because normal bureaucracy was too slow to keep up with the pace of war. Eight decades later, Ukraine has discovered the same problem from the opposite side. Drone warfare crashes into bureaucracy. Ukraine has been transforming the front into a war laboratory automated where ground drones have become essential to transport ammunition, evacuate wounded or attack Russian positions without exposing soldiers. The problem is that, while kyiv was trying to accelerate this military revolution, the bureaucracy has ended up mistakenly classifying these unmanned vehicles within the same tax category than electric cars. When an old exemption for EVs expired on January 1, drones began paying a 20% VAT. The result has been devastating: according to the industry, the army could have bought some 5,000 additional drones only in the first half of 2026 if that tax had not come into force. Thousands of drones lost at the worst moment. They counted on Insider that the impact has been especially serious because it has arrived at a critical phase of the war. Ukraine is increasingly relying on autonomous systems to compensate for human and material attrition against Russia, to the point that Zelensky claimed that his forces carried out more than 22,000 missions with ground drones in just three months. kyiv wanted to acquire 50,000 units this year, but the new VAT skyrocketed costs, froze public contracts and left manufacturers whole for months. no state orders. Some companies drastically reduced production to survive, while others tried to reclassify their robots as armored vehicles to avoid the tax burden. A trapped military industry. The chaos also reflects how the military technological revolution is advancing faster than the laws themselves. Ground drones were so new within European and Ukrainian commercial standards that they did not even there was a category clear to classify them. When a former tax exemption for electric vehicles expired, the system automatically absorbed these military robots into the same regulations. The Ministry of Defense suddenly found itself with insufficient budgets and paralyzed purchasing processes because, technically, essential weapons for the front had no longer been considered. exempt military equipment tax. Manufacturers like Tencorecreator of the popular TermIT dronethey spent up to five months without public contracts and had to survive thanks to volunteer organizations that directly supply military units. In a war economy where many companies literally live from order to order, three months without state purchases is equivalent to little less than a heart attack industrial. The big problem is not just making weapons. The episode reveals something deeper about the evolution of modern warfare. For years, drones, artificial intelligence and automation have been talked about as the future of combat, but Ukraine is discovering that the bottleneck is not always in the technology. Sometimes it is in the administrationin legislation or in bureaucratic systems designed for peacetime. Russia and Ukraine are immersed in a race of constant adaptation where every month counts and where losing half a year due to tax procedures can have direct effects on the front. The sector itself calculates that the tax exemption would save about 200 million dollarsa gigantic figure for an industry that still depends on precarious financing and accelerated production. The problem is that even if Parliament now corrects the law, the damage has already been done: delayed contracts, lost capacity and thousands of drones that never made it to the battlefield when they were needed most. The paradox of the war of the future. The story perfectly summarizes one of the great contradictions of this war. Ukraine has become the country that has integrated autonomous systems the fastest in real combat and has built an ecosystem with more than 280 companies and 550 models different from ground drones. However, that same ecosystem remains dependent on sluggish state structures, legacy regulations, and legal frameworks unable to keep pace with military innovation. While the front is filled with robots that transport ammunition, evacuate wounded or attack Russian trenches without a human driver, the State continued to administratively treat them as if they were simple electric cars. The irony could not be more brutal: one of the most technologically advanced wars of the century lost thousands of combat machines not due to lack of industrial capacity or due to Russian attacks, but because the Treasury decided to apply the same tax treatment than to a civil electric vehicle. Image | x In Xataka | A Ukrainian stork has managed to outwit a Russian drone in flight. The video is the best clue about who will win the war In Xataka | Ukraine has been terrorizing Russian soldiers with its heavy drones for years. Now they are literally giving it back.

While Europe looks at Ukraine, the US has sounded the alarms for Spain on a closer front: losing two autonomous cities

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In July 2002, a handful of Moroccan soldiers landed on the islet of Perejil and raised a Moroccan flag there. The Spanish response came days later with a military operation so rapid and measured that it ended up becoming one of the diplomatic-military episodes strangest of the recent Mediterranean. What worries Spain. While Europe concentrates much of its military attention in Ukraine and the eastern flank of NATO, a much closer concern is growing in Spain: the south of the Strait. The problem is not just Morocco or the military balance in the Maghreb, but the change in the United States’ attitude toward the region. The appearance in Washington of official documents that describe Ceuta and Melilla like cities “under Spanish administration” in Moroccan territory has generated unprecedented alarm because it breaks a historical diplomatic taboo. For decades, the sovereignty of both cities was considered out of the question for Western allies. Now some American political sectors are beginning to treat her as an open dispute susceptible to future negotiation. US pressure. Spanish concern does not arise solely from a parliamentary report, but from the political context that surrounds it. Republican congressman Mario Diaz-Balartclose to Marco Rubio’s entourage and aligned with positions very favorable to Rabat, has not only publicly defended that Ceuta and Melilla are “in Moroccan territory”, but that the own report encourages the State Department to promote diplomatic talks about their status. All this coincides with the deterioration of the relationship between Donald Trump and the Spanish Government for military spendingNATO and the disagreements over Iran. In certain strategic Spanish sectors, the feeling is beginning to spread that Washington increasingly considers most useful to Morocco as a regional and less essential partner to Spain within its Mediterranean architecture. Morocco and the new balance. The most profound change may be occurring on the other side of the Strait. Morocco has been accelerating for years its military modernization through agreements with the United States, Israel, Türkiye and France, while also promoting its own arms industry. Since 2021, industrial projects linked to drones, weapons and advanced military production have multiplied. At the same time, Rabat has consolidated his diplomatic position in Washington after the American recognition of Western Sahara. For many Spanish analysts, the problem is no longer just migratory pressure or specific border crises, but the emergence of a regional power much more militarily connected to the West and increasingly secure in its strategic position. Spain is left out. The other big concern is that Spain seems have been left out of the new network of military alliances in the Maghreb. Italy has become the main strategic partner of Algeria in the Mediterranean, expanding defense agreements, industrial cooperation and military coordination with one of the most powerful armies in Africa. Morocco, meanwhile, close ties with Washington, Paris and Tel Aviv. Spain has managed to rebuild diplomatic relations with both neighbors, but it hardly has any relevant agreements on defense matters. This vacuum is beginning to be perceived as a serious problem in certain strategic circles, especially when linked reports to the Ministry of Defense they already admit that “South of the Strait of Gibraltar, military pressure is a reality.” Ceuta and Melilla as vulnerable points. That is why the reports of the Spanish Institute for Strategic Studies raise with increasing clarity the need to a specific plan defense for Ceuta and Melilla. The focus goes far beyond the military and includes logistics, cybersecurity, maritime surveillance, institutional resilience and protection of critical infrastructure. Fear does not necessarily point to an open conventional conflict, but rather to hybrid scenarios constant pressure: migration crises, diplomatic tensions, partial blockades or political attrition campaigns. Autonomous cities thus appear as especially sensitive enclaves due to their logistical dependence and geographical isolation. A brutal return: geography. If you like, all this reflects something broader: the return of geography as a central factor of European politics. For years, Spain observed the Maghreb mainly from a migratory and commercial perspective, while the greatest threats seemed to be far from the western Mediterranean. But the war in Ukraine has accelerated regional rearmament and has reorganized alliances throughout the area. And in the midst of this transformation, Spain begins to discover that one of its potentially most delicate fronts is not in the Baltic or in Eastern Europe, but just in the other side of the strait. Image | US Army In Xataka | The US threatened to take the Rota base to Morocco. Spain has buried it with an unbeatable offer: more territory In Xataka | ANDhe tunnel between Spain and Morocco seemed like a chimera. Now a tunnel boring machine manufacturer says it is viable

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