Ukraine attacked Moscow on Wednesday with at least 11 drones that were shot down by air defences in what Russian officials called one of the biggest drone strikes on the capital since the war in Ukraine began in February 2022.

The war, largely a grinding artillery and drone battle across the fields, forests and villages of eastern Ukraine, escalated on Aug. 6 when Ukraine sent thousands of soldiers over the border into Russia’s western Kursk region.

For months, Ukraine has also fought an increasingly damaging drone war against the refineries and airfields of Russia, the world’s second largest oil exporter, though major drone attacks on the Moscow region - with a population of over 21 million - have been rarer.

Russia’s defence ministry said its air defences destroyed a total of 45 drones over Russian territory, including 11 over the Moscow region, 23 over the border region of Bryansk, six over the Belgorod region, three over the Kaluga region and two over the Kursk region.

    • Redex@lemmy.worldEnglish
      7·
      3 months ago

      Drones aren’t the be-all and end-all, especially at this stage in the war. They can cause a lot of damage but countermeasures are being used more and more and you can’t win a war with just drones.

      • Modern_medicine_isnt@lemmy.worldEnglish
        3·
        3 months ago

        Yeah, that why I mean government scale. Send a million of them. If Ukraine can send them in the hundreds, the defenses will be overwhelmed. But they do need to be able to autonomously avoid humans in my opinion. Targeting is probably the hardest part right now.

    • Soleos@lemmy.worldEnglish
      6·
      3 months ago

      Ukraine is doing fine building their own drones. They seem to have a fast iteration cycle with their growing drone industry. Their priority for foreign aid is artillery shells, missile systems, and vehicles/planes which is harder for them to produce en mass

      • JasonDJ@lemmy.zipEnglish
        2·
        3 months ago

        Especially when these drones are basically kamikazes. Last think we need is to be shipping over million-dollar Lockheed quadcopters to be met with that kind of fate.