Drones and future wars

StrrategyPage has lots of essays on drones which alas I can't keep up with since this is outside my level of expertise.

But today there is a discussion of the treatment of Russian Casualties in the Ukraine war, and I came across this snippet:

The primary source of Russian losses has been Ukrainian drones. These drones come in an increasing number of types, and new models appear rapidly. Russia has been unable to compete. To make matters worse, Ukraine has developed an effective drone interceptor, further diluting Russian offensive efforts. Over the last year, Ukrainian long-range drones have intensified their attacks on military and economic targets in western Russia, including major cities like Moscow and St Petersburg. These attacks are bringing the war home to Russian civilians who have been told for years that Russian forces were winning.

this article is for later reading at my leisure:Weapons: Drone Wars Past and Future

In 2026, Ukraine plans to build at least eight million, and possibly ten million drones. They built about five million drones last year. In 2024, the total was 1.5 million drones. There have been problems. Chinese component producers are having a hard time keeping up, and last year, to assist the Russians, China halted sending drone components to Ukraine

those Chinese drones are spies for China here in the Philppines: Lots of underseas drones in the area, many being civilian drones. But China can control the regular drones too:  Philippine mission's China-made drone won't fly in West Philippine Sea

A China-made drone for a Filipino civilian mission to the West Philippine Sea would not take off, as it received prompts that required the operator to register the unit with Chinese authorities....,,According to Vonne Aquino's report on "24 Oras," the drone received the prompts even when the Atin Ito vessel was well within the Philippines, just 127 nautical miles from Mindoro...

and then there are the underwater drones:

MANILA — Five underwater drones found by Philippine fishermen were capable of gathering information that could aid in "underwater warfare", the country's military said Tuesday, noting at least one had relayed a signal to China.

That article is 2025.

StrategyPage essay on the latest aggression of China against the Philippines LINK