In Ukraine war, a race to acquire smarter, deadlier drones

By OLEKSANDR STASHEVSKYI and FRANK BAJAK
Associated Press

KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — Never in the history of warfare have drones been used as intensively as in Ukraine, where they often play an outsized role in who lives and dies. Russians and Ukrainians alike depend heavily on unmanned aerial vehicles to pinpoint enemy positions and guide their hellish artillery strikes. But after months of fighting, the drone fleets of both sides are depleted. The demand for off-the-shelf consumer models remains intense in Ukraine, as do efforts to modify amateur drones to make them more resistant to jamming. Both sides are crowdfunding to replace battlefield losses. Drone footage has come to define much of the public view of the war in Ukraine.