Bombers in flames on social networks. Photos of shipping containers filled with drones. Provocative declarations on both sides on the damage scale.
On June 1, Ukraine targeted several Russian air bases using first -person drones (FPV), cheap air vehicles that are remotely operated by drivers using camera flows. According to reports, Ukraine has used automatic learning algorithms to guide drones to the target area.
The attack, nicknamed “Spider’s Web”, has demonstrated the current material capacities of modern war. And while businesses and governments take place to develop artificial general intelligence (AG) – to which advanced artificial intelligence systems can quickly understand, learn and apply knowledge – the operation also gives an overview of what the future of war could look like.
Spider’s web and the impact of FPV drones
The Ukraine Operation Security Service (SBU) has eliminated targets up to 8,000 kilometers (nearly 5,000 miles) from the fronts. As the dust settles, analysts are starting to wonder if anywhere is out of reach of FPV drones.
Some reports suggest that dozens of strategic bombers (some are able to deliver nuclear weapons) have been destroyed or deactivated by 117 FPV drones, although Moscow has only a handful of aircraft have been struck. Western assessments put the figure within 10.
But the extent of the attack, although impressive, is not its most remarkable appearance. After all, the operation follows an attack on Russian drones at the end of May involving nearly 500 unmanned air vehicles. The attack on Ukraine may have been smaller, but it compensated it in logistical sparkle.
First, the parts were introduced as a smuggling in the country and the drones were assembled. Vasyl Maliuk, the head of the SBU, said to the BBC that they were then loaded on trucks with secret compartments and led by Russian letters without distrust to places near the air bases. When the expeditions reached their destination, roofs on the trucks have retracted to reveal the hidden equipment. And the drones have taken off.
Spider’s canvas depended on three distinct but related capacities: logistics to deliver drones, deception to keep them hidden and coordination to pilot dozens simultaneously.
Yes, the attack confirms that consumable drones are the 21st century weapon. But Ukraine’s strike serves as a visceral example of how AGA will work as a tool to fight war – and how humans will work alongside Ag.
War fueled by Ag
Make no mistake, Warcraft fed by Agrès is coming. Over the past two years, the AI industry has invested more and more in AI military applications and gravity to “security” as one of its organizational principles.
Frontier Labs fits into the national security state. For example, in June 2024, Openai appointed the retired general of the American army Paul Nakasone to his board of directors. In December 2024, the AI-Giant announced that it had associated itself with the holding of military defense technology Andendil to develop drone defense systems. And Google, my former employer, extended the “national security imperatives for the AI era” earlier this year.
The allusions of the technology sectors with national security and AI have a certain quality of change of form. It is not always clear if someone refers to defensive or offensive AI capacities, or if it is even possible to carefully separate the first from the second.
In the context of armed conflicts, things become even more muddy. The idea that a system acted sufficiently capable could possibly pilot drones is already in the minds of military planners, but Ukraine’s strike on Russia gives us a much more specific image of what to expect.
Spider’s web was eighteen months. Meanwhile, 150 small attack drones and 300 explosive devices were introduced as a smuggling in Russia to stage the attack.
Rather than a large expedition, the SBU has probably engaged in fragmentary traffic to avoid detection. Possibly provide components through borders, using companies before or welding managers to go through control points.
The fog of war is thick. We may never know it with certainty, but we know that end drones have been packed in special mobile containers that seemed discreet from the outside.
According to reports, truck engines have all told a similar story. A businessman approached them to collect what seemed to be wooden cabins and deliver them to various places around Russia. They accepted and thought about it.
Once the trucks are in position, the strike was launched. At the predetermined time, the roof panels of each container were opened remotely to release a swarm of drones (probably controlled remotely by the report on the Russian telecommunications networks).
The future of war
Spider’s Web offers a window on how AGE could overcome similar attacks in the future.
AG could analyze the transport routes to find the safest, fastest and least visible way to move freight. It could plan for truck routes which avoid occupied control points, choose transit times when the border guards are in sub-employment, and even take into account satellite viaducts or drone surveillance.
Such a system could coordinate multimodal logistics (think of plans, trains and cars) with timing that no human team could match. Without forgetting that he could bite traffic models, rail schedules and weather data to find the perfect time for an attack.
This hypothetical combat act could automatically generate business entities with registration documents, tax files and websites to serve as a cover. It could forge driving licenses, passports and employee identifiers who pass an automated verification – much faster than humans today.
Aside from the documents, an AGE could manage a whole series of deception technologies. For example, AGE could issue false GPS signals to confuse the monitoring of satellites or hacking in the video surveillance flow of an installation to make old images loop while the agents move the equipment. When it is time to strike, AG could guide each drone towards its target as part of a single unified swarm, optimized to prevent collisions and spaced to maximize the coverage.
AGE can even make it possible to monitor the electronic war environment of war and switching frequencies if it smells of jamming on the current channel. If an air defense system begins to follow the swarm, the AGE could order all drones to disperse or fall to the electric altitude of the field to increase their chances of survival.
As soon as the destination is within reach, AG could help drones independently recognize the types of targets and to target the most damaging impact points (for example by guiding a drone at the exact location of the fuel tank of an aircraft).
The limits and dangers of act
Admittedly, these are still predictions on what AGE can be able in the future. And there will probably be limits.
Precision hand -like work such as detectors to weld, balance rotors and packaging warheads is difficult to automate on a large scale without custom factory line. Robots can do it, but you still need humans to make the initial configuration. In addition, explosives sweat, Lithium-ion Puffs Puff and cheap FPV aeronic cells are deformed if they are left in deposits not controlled by climate. Periodic maintenance such as the change of desiccant packs or the exchange of swollen cells would probably still remain vital. A swarm of drones fed at ACT would probably still need guards who can move without attracting attention.
Finally, the links resistant to jamming require spectrum licenses, personalized SIM provisioning or pirate base stations introduced in the country. The deployment of this communication infrastructure (such as antennas or repeaters) requires boots in the field.
But even with a large dose of skepticism, I find it difficult to see the Ukrainian strike as something other than a postcard of the future. Problems may seem insurmountable, but you should never bet against the machine evoking an unorthodox solution.
I fear that the best scenario before us is the one where attacks like these can simply be delivered a little faster. The worst case is that in which the web style operation of a spider can be carried out more quickly from orders of magnitude by a handful of people.
The reflection on the implications of the act is useful in that it reminds us that the power flows towards anyone can orchestrate the complexity faster than the opponent does not understand it. Complexity is the strategic currency of war in the era of information, and AG is an accelerator of complexity.
If AGE finds its way in bad hands, it could become much easier to remove a deadly attack. It is also true for great powers as for rogue actors. This is the new strategic reality, and each soldier must plan this.
What the Ukraine Spider web strike has taught us is that the equipment of an AG Warfighter is ready. All that remains is the software.
