The Learning Curve: Ukraine's Attrition Campaign and the PLA's Iran War Study
My weekly update on war and strategic competition. This week, Ukraine's long-range strike & ground ops, Chinese learning from the Iran War and my Big 5 reading recommendations.
We have not reached an agreement. Vice President Vance at conclusion of Islamabad peace talks.
Iran has no plans for the next round of talks. Iranian government statement in Iranian media.
The week of 5–12 April 2026 brought significant developments across both the Ukraine, Middle East and Pacific theatres, underscoring the interconnected nature of contemporary war, strategic competition, learning and adaptation.
In Ukraine, the war's fifth year produced a formal 32-hour Easter truce that both sides accused each other of violating. President Putin's surprise ceasefire announcement, mirroring a Ukrainian proposal he had previously dismissed, reveals which side faces greater pressure as diplomacy tentatively resumes.
While the war in Iran is temporarily on hold for peace talks, which as of today have not yet yielded a longer term agreement, CENTCOM announced that the U.S. Navy has begun initial operations to re-open the Strait of Hormuz.
In the Pacific, the Iran War has become an intensive learning laboratory for the People's Liberation Army (PLA), offering real-time observation of American military capabilities and limitations. China's integration of satellite intelligence with Iranian precision strike systems, and energy security calculations driven by Strait of Hormuz closure, are also covered in this Pacific update. Meanwhile, Taiwan's opposition parties continue blocking critical drone procurement funding even as the PLA demonstrates new AI-enabled swarm systems.
Welcome to this week’s edition of The Big Five
Ukraine
First up, welcome home to the latest group of 175 Ukrainian prisoners of war released in the past 24 hours!
Zelenskyy’s Commentary. President Zelenskyy was active in public communication during the week, addressing a range of strategic issues that reflected growing impatience with Russia’s conduct and the international community’s divided attention.
On 5 April, speaking exclusively to The Associated Press in Istanbul, Zelenskyy delivered a frank assessment of how the Iran war was complicating Ukraine’s strategic position. He noted that “we have to recognise that we are not the priority for today.” Zelenskyy also described how he feared a prolonged Middle East war would reduce Patriot missile deliveries to Ukraine, with the already-limited supply set to become “smaller and smaller day by day.”
He also identified a structural tension in Ukraine’s energy strategy: surging oil prices driven by Iran’s closure of the Strait of Hormuz were boosting Kremlin oil revenues, directly undermining Kyiv’s effort to make the war financially prohibitive for Russia. ‘Russia gets additional money because of this,’ he said bluntly. His offer to share Ukrainian maritime drone expertise with Gulf states to help secure the strait was, notably, rejected by Trump, who stated that America ‘knows more about drones than anybody.’
Following Putin’s Easter ceasefire announcement on 10 April, Zelensky’s response was measured. He stated on X that Ukraine had “repeatedly stated we are ready for reciprocal steps” and announced Kyiv’s willingness to extend the truce. He also asked that Washington reimpose Russian oil sanctions now that an Iran ceasefire was in effect, accusing Moscow of having “played the Americans again” by using oil market arguments to get sanctions lifted. Zelenskyy also proposed a trilateral leaders’ meeting and warned that the coming spring and summer months would be “quite difficult politically and diplomatically.”
Separately, Zelenskyy accused Russia of providing intelligence to Iran, citing what he described as “irrefutable evidence” that Russia was sharing signals and electronic intelligence with Iran to target U.S. forces deployed in the Middle East. The accusation, while directed at Russia, also challenges the Trump administration to acknowledge that Russia was helping Iran target American service personnel.
Ukraine’s Long-Range Strike Operations: Into the Caspian and Beyond. Ukraine’s long-range strike campaign continued its geographic expansion this week, carrying the war further into Russia’s energy infrastructure than at any previous point and demonstrating a strike envelope that now reaches over 1,000 kilometres from the front line in multiple directions simultaneously.
The most significant strike of the week was the overnight attack on 10 April against two Lukoil-operated offshore drilling platforms in the northern Caspian Sea. Ukraine’s General Staff confirmed that the ice-resistant stationary platforms at the V. Grayfer and Yuri Korchagin oil fields were struck, about 1,000 kilometres from the front line. The General Staff stated these platforms serve as a vital link in supplying fuel and lubricants to Russian occupation forces. Kyiv Post reported that Presidential Office head Kyrylo Budanov framed the strikes as a negotiating tool, asserting they strengthen Ukraine’s position in future talks with Russia.
Earlier in the week, on 6 April, Ukrainian drones struck the Caspian Pipeline Consortium (CPC) terminal at Novorossiysk on the Black Sea, damaging a pipeline, a loading and unloading terminal, and setting four oil product storage tanks on fire. Al Jazeera reported that the strikes came a day after Ukrainian drones hit Russia’s Baltic Sea port of Primorsk and the NORSI oil refinery in Nizhny Novgorod. The CPC pipeline handles about 1% of global oil supplies and around 80% of Kazakhstan’s exports. The Moscow Times noted that Reuters calculations show recent strikes on Russian oil infrastructure have cut Russia’s refining capacity by 17%, or about 1.1 million barrels per day.
President Putin announced a halt to gasoline exports from 1 April. This was a direct consequence of weeks of Ukrainian pressure on Baltic export infrastructure. A week later, Ukrainian drones also struck an oil pumping station in Krasnodar Krai on 9 April and attacked a fuel oil terminal in occupied Crimea. The accumulated economic pressure of the Ukrainian long-range strike campaign, on refinery output, export capacity, and the domestic fuel supply, is beginning to hurt Russia in ways that may hopefully shift Putin’s strategic calculus about the costs and benefits of the war.
Importantly, this long-range strike campaign pressure is being complemented by Ukrainian pressure on Russian ground forces, and the Russian Spring Offensive.
The Ground War. The ground situation this week confirmed the pattern established in March. Russia’s spring offensive has generated some momentum in specific sectors but continues to fall short of demonstrating that Russia is able to seize the remainder of The Donbas in 2026.
The Russia Matters April 8 report card documents a week of advances and Ukrainian counter attacks. Russian forces advanced near Prishchane, Pryvillia, Hryshyne, and Kotlynne, while Ukrainian Defence Forces cleared areas near Rodynske, Nove Shakhove, Stepnohirsk, Novoselivka, Sichneve, and Ambarne. The situation remains one of costly, incremental Russian progress. It is a pattern we have gotten used to in the past four years.
ISW’s 10 April assessment proposed that Russian forces are prioritising offensive operations on the Hulyaipole axis of advance over defending against Ukrainian counterattacks on their Oleksandrivka axis of advance. But the Russian ground forces are not making significant advances west of Hulyaipole despite this prioritisation. Meanwhile, Ukrainian forces advanced on the Kupyansk, Slovyansk, Pokrovsk, and Hulyaipole axes during the reporting week.
The Fortress Belt in Eastern Ukraine continues to absorb Russian pressure without yielding significant territorial gain for them. Russian forces continue to employ FAB-3000 guided glide bombs and Lancet loitering munitions on the Slovyansk axis of advance as battlefield air interdiction ahead of any ground assault.
Separately, Russian forces have (again) been accused of using chemical weapons on the frontline. The ISW 5 April assessment described how Russia employs gas grenades in frontline chemical weapons strikes in violation of the Chemical Weapons Convention. The Ukrainian General Staff reported that it has documented around 400 instances of Russian forces using ammunition equipped with chemical agents in March 2026 alone, and over 13,000 instances since February 2022. Russian forces frequently use drone-dropped aerosol gas grenades.
Russia declared on 1 April that it had ‘completed the liberation’ of Luhansk Oblast — covering the remaining 0.2% of Ukrainian-held territory there. The substance of this declaration is minimal, but this is a political statement. It is designed by Russia to generate pressure on Ukraine to concede that the trajectory of the battlefield is irreversible – and convince the U.S. administration that this should drive Ukrainian territorial concessions.
Russian Aerial Attacks on Ukraine. Russia’s aerial campaign maintained its record March tempo this week, with the additional and deeply troubling dimension of confirmed chemical weapons use at the tactical level.
In terms of aerial bombardment, the 6 April attack on Odesa stood out for its civilian toll. A Russian drone struck an apartment block in the southern port city, killing two women and a toddler and injuring eleven people, including a pregnant woman and an infant under one year of age. President Zelenskyy reported this week that over the previous week Russia had launched more than 2,800 attack drones, nearly 1,350 guided aerial bombs, and more than 40 missiles of various types. On the night of 2–3 April, Russia had launched 579 aerial attack assets in a combined strike, comprising 10 Iskander-M ballistic missiles, 25 Kh-101 cruise missiles, 2 Iskander-K missiles, and 542 drones, of which Ukrainian air defences destroyed 541.
General Syrskyi: Drones Destroying Russian Forces Faster Than They Can Recruit. Ukrainian Commander-in-Chief Oleksandr Syrskyi made several significant public statements during the week, centred on the performance of Ukraine’s unmanned systems forces and the trajectory of attrition against the Russian military.
On 9 April, Syrskyi stated on Telegram that Ukraine’s Defence Forces continue to hold the strategic initiative, and that unmanned systems units are “currently inflicting the most significant and effective damage on Russian troops.” He stated that “for four months in a row, starting from December 2025, our unmanned systems units have neutralised more enemy personnel than Russia recruits to their ranks.” He attributed this performance to the combined effect of domestic unmanned aerial systems production, improved operator skills, and organisational decisions by Ukrainian military command. Syrskyi also confirmed that Ukrainian ground robotic systems increased the number of completed tasks by more than 50% in March compared to February, corroborating the Ministry of Defence data released on 7 April.
Syrskyi also confirmed Russia’s expanding unmanned forces, noting that Russian personnel in unmanned units reached 101,000 by early April and is expected to grow to 165,500 by year’s end. This is an acknowledgement that the drone competition it is a race both sides are running at expanding industrial scale. But despite this rhetoric on the expanding use of drones, people remain a central element of effective military forces, a point made again this week by Kyrylo Budanov, head of the Office of the President of Ukraine.
In his April assessment, Syrskyi described Ukraine’s 2026 military goal as a strategic defensive operation to deplete Russian forces while simultaneously building Ukrainian reserves and creating conditions for future large-scale offensive operations. The pattern of operations on the ground in the past two months appears to partially validate this strategic intention.
9000 UGV Missions in March. This week, the Ukrainian military announced that uncrewed ground vehicles (UGV) had undertaken 9000 separate missions over the month of March 2026. As I noted in my previous weekly update, Ukraine is accelerating the combat deployment of UGVs in 2026, and they are playing an increasing roll in combat operations, in addition to the logistic functions that have fulfilled in the past year. This is another massive learning opportunity for western military organisations. You can read the full story at this link.
Diplomacy: The Easter Ceasefire and Its Implications. The context of the latest ceasefire matters as much as the ceasefire itself. Understanding why Putin announced it, and what Ukraine did with it, provides useful insights about the trajectory of peace negotiations.
On 10 April, Putin announced via the Kremlin a 32-hour ceasefire effective from 16:00 on 11 April through the end of 12 April. CNN reported that the announcement was made without advance consultation with the United States and was not linked to any resumption of trilateral talks. Zelenskyy responded within hours, confirming Ukrainian compliance and offering to extend it. On the evening of the announcement, Russian envoy Kirill Dmitriev arrived in the United States to meet Trump administration officials on a Ukraine settlement and broader U.S.-Russia economic cooperation — timing that was clearly not coincidental.
Russia’s bombard-then-offer-truce pattern, which echoes last year’s 30-hour Easter truce, was designed to seize the diplomatic initiative after weeks of Ukrainian diplomatic efforts. Kyiv had proposed the Easter ceasefire for weeks; Moscow dismissed it while continuing attacks, then unilaterally announced the same measure and framed it as a Kremlin initiative. Ukraine has stated that Russia has already violated the ceasefire around 400 times.
A Kyiv visit by Witkoff, Kushner, and Senator Graham, the first time either U.S. envoy would have set foot on Ukrainian soil, remains expected in the days following Easter, according to Reuters reporting on 4 April. Whether this Kyiv visit translates into a fourth round of talks, which stalled after the Geneva round was postponed by the Iran war, remains to be seen. The most recent reporting on the visit, from the Kyiv Independent, casts doubt on whether the visit will proceed.
The Pacific
This week, I have not included a specific section on the Iran War. Rather, I have focused on what China and other Pacific nations might be learning from the Iran War in this section. I explore how the PLA might be using the Iran War as a learning opportunity, Iran-China collaboration and the impact of energy insecurity – a result of the Iran War – on nations across the Pacific.
The Iran War as PLA Learning Laboratory. In a recent article for the terrific blog CIMSEC, Commander Ander S. Heiles, USN explores how “in January 1991, Chinese military officers watched CNN footage of the United States dismantling the Iraqi Army and experienced what one People’s Liberation Army (PLA) analyst later called a “psychological nuclear attack.” Desert Storm displayed every capability the PLA lacked, and China had no choice but to begin remaking its military from the ground up.” He then proposes that nearly four decades later, the classroom for the PLA has re-opened.
The Iran war has become an intensive study object for the PLA, offering real-time observation of how the United States wages modern warfare. Analysis published in early April identifies the key lesson Beijing has extracted: the US military remains formidable, capable of deploying overwhelming force and conducting sustained precision operations from air and sea—but this capability operates within an administration able to fight only one war at a time, with stripped-out decision support mechanisms that would normally flow through the National Security Council.
South China Morning Post reporting emphasizes that while the PLA absorbs lessons about U.S. precision strike capabilities and AI-ISR integration, it is also noting limitations: U.S. interceptors proved 92% effective against Iranian missiles and drones, but American drone warfare has struggled. Iranian drones relying on Chinese components performed relatively well, killing US troops and launching confusing swarms that resulted in Kuwait shooting down three US F-15 fighter jets in a friendly-fire incident. Iranian strikes on soft US-linked targets in the Gulf—housing, fuel depots, logistics hubs, and early warning radar systems—demonstrated vulnerabilities in exquisite platforms that Western militaries have over-indexed.
A recent Foreign Affairs assessment argues that ballistic missiles and drones may not be the decisive offensive weapons many countries, including the Chinese, assumed. They remain effective in campaigns of attrition and coercion, but this is a slow process, not a path to quick victory. For a potential China-Taiwan conflict, the implication challenges the assumption that China could use long-range strikes to severely degrade American air and naval operations. The U.S. may be able to carry out far more effective operations against China than analysts previously thought. Potentially, this might give China reason to refrain from military aggression.
Despite this, the PLA is likely to be feeding observations from the Iran War into its modernization programs and warfighting doctrine. The PLA will be absorbing lessons with particular urgency across AI-enabled warfare, command protection, asset dispersal, infrastructure hardening, and nuclear deterrence.
China-Iran Intelligence and Technology Cooperation. A recent Small Wars Journal analysis documents how access to advanced satellite intelligence, the BeiDou navigation system, modern radar technologies, and electronic warfare expertise may have significantly enhanced Iran’s ability to conduct more precise missile and drone strikes while improving capacity to defend against sophisticated air campaigns.
Intelligence networks, space-based surveillance, navigation systems, and cyber capabilities now operate together to create an integrated architecture that provides the foundation for contemporary precision warfare. Technological partnerships between nations can dramatically alter strategic balance even when one partner is not directly involved in combat operations. TRT World reporting from early April documents surge of highly technical China-origin content explaining how U.S. aircraft could be detected and targeted using relatively low-cost systems, with tutorials gaining millions of views across Chinese and Iranian social media.
The integration of BeiDou navigation into Iranian weapons systems provides alternative to GPS networks controlled by the U.S., which could be degraded or blocked during military conflicts. Iran formally transitioned its military architecture from GPS to China’s BeiDou navigation system in mid-2025 following the June 2025 conflict, according to Defence Security Asia, with Iranian deputy minister Chitsaz stating that GPS disruptions pushed Iran toward the BeiDou alternative. Al Jazeera subsequently reported improved Iranian targeting accuracy attributable to the transition This creates an Iranian version of a modern operational ‘kill chain’ with Chinese satellites providing surveillance and targeting intelligence and Iranian missiles and drones carrying out kinetic strike.
Finally, CNN reported over the weekend that U.S. intelligence has indicated China is preparing to deliver new air defence systems to Iran within the next few weeks. President Trump told CNN that China will have “big problems” if it ships the weapons to Iran.
Of course, none of this should be a surprise.
China has been aiding Russia almost from the beginning of its war against Ukraine, and the 2024 NATO Summit declaration described how “the PRC has become a decisive enabler of Russia’s war against Ukraine through its so-called “no limits” partnership and its large-scale support for Russia’s defence industrial base.” China has also helped Iran. This article published by the Small Wars Journal explores China-Iran intelligence collaboration, the U.S. China Economic and Security Review Commission has issued a detailed fact sheet on their economic and intelligence links, the report at this link explores Russian and Chinese military assistance to Iran, and finally, this 2025 report explores China-Iran security cooperation. And, I published my own report that explores the authoritarian learning and adaptation bloc in 2025, called Adaptation War.
Key themes across these reports exploring China-Iran cooperation include the following:
Intelligence & Surveillance: BeiDou navigation, satellite intelligence, geospatial data, radar systems (YLC-8B)
Dual-Use Technology: Advanced composites, precision tools, guidance components, semiconductors, chemical precursors
Supply Chain Obfuscation: Shell companies, transshipment hubs, front companies, shadow fleet
Post-Conflict Reconstitution: Rapid rebuilding of missile/drone infrastructure after Israeli strikes
Strategic Ambiguity: China provides enabling technology while maintaining public diplomatic neutrality
“Axis of Evasion/Upheaval”: Coordinated sanctions circumvention among China, Russia, Iran, North Korea
The reports document a pattern of Chinese technological support that enhances Iranian precision warfare capabilities, and indirectly helps China to ensure American military effort cannot be concentrated in the Pacific, while avoiding direct military intervention by the PLA.
Energy Security and Strategic Reserves. The Iran war fuel crisis has caused immediate volatility in energy markets, with Brent crude surging 10-13% to $80-82 per barrel by early March 2026. Iran’s closure of the Strait of Hormuz disrupted 20% of global oil supplies and significant LNG volumes. The International Energy Agency characterized this as the “greatest global energy security challenge in history.” Exports from the Middle East typically flow to Asian countries, with China, India, Japan, and South Korea accounting for 75% of oil and 59% of LNG exports.
China imported 15.8% more oil in January-February 2026, building strategic reserves to approximately 1.2 billion barrels. However, prolonged closure beyond three months would pose a serious test to China’s assumptions about sustainable oil supply disruptions driven by major regional conflict.
Fortune reporting describes how Japan and South Korea have substantial oil stockpiles lasting over 200 days. Other Asian governments are managing fuel stockpiles carefully; Thailand suspended crude exports on 1 March.
China’s Latest Five-Year Plan. Last month, the CCP released its latest version of China’s Five-Year Plan. This version of the plan seeks to achieve “basic socialist modernization” with six main principles centered on “upholding the party’s overall leadership” and “high-quality development.”
This week, Taiwanese analyst K. Tristan Tang released an analysis of the military aspects of the new plan. By comparing the defence components of the 13th through 15th Five-Year Plans and factoring in recent developments in the PLA and China’s defence industry, Tang proposes that:
The latest plan is not just about addressing the many unfinished reforms of the past decade—it also introduces more concrete implementation and supporting measures. Given that much of the PLA’s progress over the past ten years has been achieved despite inefficiencies and uneven reform, if this new plan is implemented more effectively, the pace of capability growth could be significantly more pronounced than before.
It is an excellent analysis, published by the Jamestown Foundation, and I have included the full piece in this week’s Big Five reading recommendations.
PLA Emphasis on AI-Enabled Drone Swarms. The AEI/ISW China & Taiwan Update for 3 April documents the PLA’s increasing emphasis on AI-enabled swarm technology to overwhelm advanced air defences in Taiwan and U.S. military infrastructure during conflict. CCTV released footage on 25 March of the PRC’s ‘Atlas’ drone swarm system conducting training. The Global Times has reported that each Atlas launch vehicle can deploy 48 drones, with a single command vehicle coordinating 96 drones simultaneously. The PRC appears to be emphasising AI-enabled swarming technology to address the vulnerability that mass-produced drones face against sophisticated jamming and electronic warfare.
China Builds a New Island. This year, China has been conducting dredging and land reclamation activity at Antelope Reef in the Paracel Islands. This amounts to the first major artificial island-building that the Chinese have undertaken in the South China Sea since 2017. An analysis of this project by the CSIS Asia Maritime Transparency Initiative finds that:
The estimated area of reclaimed land at Antelope Reef at roughly 1,490 acres.
Antelope Reef can now accommodate a 9,000-foot runway of the type China has already constructed at Woody Island, Mischief Reef, Subi Reef, and Fiery Cross Reef.
While several features in the Crescent island group have harbors, the lagoon at Antelope Reef would dwarf those. This could allow more coastguard along with large numbers of maritime militia to maintain a presence at the reef.
Antelope’s size would also enable it to accommodate the robust infrastructure seen at Woody and China’s “big three” outposts (Mischief, Subi, and Fiery Cross) in the Spratlys, including diesel power plants, underground storage facilities, coastal defense emplacements, surface-to-air and anti-ship missile facilities, as well as numerous surveillance and electronic warfare installations.
You can read the full report on China’s project at Antelope Reef at this link.
Taiwan Defence Budget Gridlock and Drone Procurement. Taiwan’s main opposition parties continue preventing Taiwan from acquiring systems critical to modern warfare. The 3 April AEI/ISW assessment emphasizes the DPP government promotes a $40 billion budget to procure 200,000 unmanned systems, fund Taiwan’s domestic arms industry, and develop an integrated air and missile defence network alongside conventional US procurements. Both TPP and KMT versions totalling around $12 billion only fund conventional procurements and omit funding for large-scale drone procurement and IAMD systems.
KMT Chairwoman’s April Beijing Visit. During the week, the leader of Taiwan’s KMT political party visited Beijing and met with Xi Jinping. The Congressional Research Service notes KMT Chairwoman Cheng Li-wun’s visit to Beijing in April 2026 occurs ahead of President Trump’s planned May summit with Xi. Beijing suspended communication with Taiwan’s government in 2016 after President Lai’s predecessor declined to endorse the ‘1992 Consensus.’ A useful backgrounder on this 1992 consensus can be read here.
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It’s time to explore this week’s recommended readings.
In this week’s Big Five, I have included an analysis of the military dimensions of the new Chinese Five-Year Plan, a good piece on Carter Malawian’s views of China’s lessons from the contemporary war in Iran, as well as articles on the U.S. defence industrial base, Ukraine’s technology ecosystem and the U.S. air campaign against Iran.
As always, if you only have the time available to read one of my recommendations, the first is my pick of the week.
Happy reading!
1. Boosting PLA Combat Power
In this new analysis by K. Tristan Tang published by the Jamestown Foundation, development of the Chinese military is explored in the wake of the new CCP Five Year plan that was recently released. It is a thorough and very informative analysis. As the author notes, “this iteration adds a section on military governance, in addition to the recurring focus on combat capability and military–civil fusion, and emphasises military theory, military governance, and “spin-on” mechanisms for facilitating the integration of civilian technologies into the PLA.” But there is a caution, as he identifies that “the repeated appearance of policies that have existed for years highlights the limited effectiveness of past reforms.” You can read the full piece at this link.
2. The Iran War’s Real Lessons for China
In this article published by Foreign Affairs, Carter Malkasian examines the recent combat operations against Iran. His key lesson is that the success of high-end Western missile defences against Iranian strikes calls into question the strategic effectiveness of ballistic missiles and drones. In short, they may not be the decisive offensive weapons that many countries thought them to be. As he notes in the article, “the United States may be able to carry out far more effective operations against China than analysts once thought—and this potential could give China good reason to refrain from military aggression for some time.” The full article is available at this link.
3. Ukraine’s Tech Ecosystem: Lessons for the Rest of Us
In this article for The Atlantic Council, Valeriya Ionan explores how Ukraine has transformed its pre-war, moribund defence industry into a new era, innovative technology ecosystem that develops and deploys new systems at pace. As the author notes, “under extreme conditions, Ukraine has built a fast, adaptive, innovation-driven defence ecosystem of the kind that other countries, including larger powers, have been trying to design for years but have struggled to implement due to structural constraints.” The full article is available here.
4. Rebuilding the Arsenal
This week, the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments released a new report exploring the transition from peacetime to wartime manufacturing. Called “Arsenal in Transition”, this new study looks the American car industry’s transition to wartime production at the beginning of World War II and how that influenced overall production capacity as demand for military materiel soared. The report also proposes several historical lessons for modern mobilisation planners and examines the feasibility of implementing industrial conversion practices. The full report is available at this link.
5. Assessing U.S. Air Warfare Theory and Doctrine
This week, the Institute for the Study of War published an interesting assessment of how America applied air power in its war against Iran. Given the minimal number of case studies about the application of traditional AirPower during the war in Ukraine, and the overwhelming focus on the rise of drones, this study of conventional AirPower is a welcome complement to the study of drone warfare. Both conventional aircraft and drones are likely to play important roles in future conflicts. You can read the full assessment here.