EditWhen drones become nukes and allies become suppliers
Ukraine under siege is not only defending itself but writing the manual for modern warfare
While NATO deliberates, Ukraine absorbs nightly bombardments and adapts faster than any military academy syllabus could keep up, writes Sed Tkachuk.
Volodymyr (Sed) Tkachuk is a communications specialist and free-lance journalist, signing Sed Tkachuk.
“Stopping Russia now is cheaper than wondering who will be the first to create a simple drone carrying a nuclear warhead… We are experiencing the most destructive arms race in human history.” — Volodymyr Zelenskyy at the UN General Assembly
“I declare that France today recognises the State of Palestine.” — Emmanuel Macron
“In Gaza, Palestinians continue to endure suffering beyond imagination. Israel is responsible for one of the cruelest genocides in modern history.” — Francesca Albanese, United Nations Special Rapporteur on the Occupied Palestinian Territories
Wars used to be measured in megatons and missile ranges. Now they are measured in wingspans and lines of code. The arms race is no longer vertical – stacking warheads higher and higher – but horizontal, multiplied across the sky in buzzing fleets of drones guided by software that learns faster than treaties can be drafted.
Ukraine is the laboratory of this new geometry. Russia throws Shaheds, Gerans, and home-built hybrids across its borders like seeds. Ukraine, with Western backing, responds with Patriot interceptors, electronic jamming, and homegrown FPV drones. Zelenskyy’s warning at the UN wasn’t a rhetorical flourish. It was a field report from the frontlines of a war where the future of combat has already arrived.
The imbalance is grotesque and faintly comical. Russia churns out drones at $10,000 a piece, while NATO fires interceptors worth $400,000 to knock them down.
One side floods the sky; the other empties its treasuries to clear it again.
The irony is bitter: in the twenty-first century, military power isn’t about who builds the biggest bomb, but who can waste money slower.
Meanwhile, the alliance that prides itself on unity finds new ways to hesitate. NATO leaders speak solemnly of “ironclad commitments,” but in practice, bureaucracy lags behind reality.
The theatre is familiar: emergency summits, carefully worded communiqués, endless chatter about Article 5 without ever daring to implement it. The strongest alliance in history has learned to schedule deterrence like issuing a press release.
One cannot help but imagine the minutes of these meetings: War postponed until next quarter.
And while NATO deliberates, Ukraine improvises. The country absorbs nightly bombardments and adapts faster than any military academy syllabus could keep up. Civilian programmers join drone units; mechanics retrofit FPVs from scrap; small brigades invent tactics on the fly.
Ukraine under siege is not only defending itself but writing the manual for modern warfare — a manual its supposed allies will one day purchase at a premium, bound in NATO-branded leather.
Days after the drone incursion, Poland finally moved: a decree was signed granting NATO the right to deploy forces on Polish soil under Operation Eastern Sentry.
Nearby, Romania is rewriting its own rules. Romanian lawmakers recently approved a law authorising the military to shoot down drones that breach its airspace if they pose threats.
Meanwhile, on 23 September, Trump publicly urged NATO countries to shoot down Russian aircraft that violate their airspace.
Now the stage is set: Poland opens its skies to NATO guns, Romania arms its own decision, and Trump commands from the balcony.
Justice in war is a phrase that sounds almost paradoxical, yet its absence is the thread connecting Ukraine and Gaza. Russia bombs cities into silence and calls it liberation. Israel flattens Gaza’s hospitals and neighbourhoods and calls it self-defence. Both speak the language of necessity while committing atrocities that defy it.
Ukraine’s suffering is acknowledged by Western leaders in solemn tones, yet some of those same leaders funnel weapons to Israel as it grinds Gaza into rubble. Solidarity has become a selective currency: priceless in Kyiv, negotiable in Rafah.
If Russia is condemned for targeting civilians, how does Israel escape the same verdict? If Ukraine is told justice requires arms, why is Palestine told justice requires patience?
This double standard came into focus at the UN General Assembly, where Macron declared France’s recognition of the State of Palestine — a flicker of principle in a chamber otherwise fogged by procedural smoke.
France joins a long list: Spain, Ireland, Norway, Slovenia, and over 140 UN members have formally recognised Palestine. Their statements vary in tone but echo the same refrain: justice delayed is justice denied.
Independent Ukraine has not formally declared a new recognition in recent years, at least not in a way that is clearly documented as a sovereign act separate from the Soviet legacy
Across the ocean, Washington resists. The United States refuses to call Gaza’s calamity a genocide — Rwanda be damned — refuses to recognise Palestinian statehood. Meanwhile, Francesca Albanese, the UN’s Special Rapporteur, spares no words: “Israel is responsible for one of the cruelest genocides in modern history.”
It is the same tragic pattern: justice acknowledged in speeches, smothered in action. Europe rediscovers its conscience at the microphone, only to misplace it in the corridors outside.
Zelenskyy warned the world: stopping Russia now is cheaper than waiting for the first nuclear-armed drone. The price isn’t theoretical — it is being paid daily in Kharkiv’s shattered windows, in Odesa’s blackout nights, in bombardments that strike small towns near the front.
And yet the world moves with glacial reluctance, as though the future will pause politely until its committees are ready.
The arms race isn’t “coming.” It’s here, buzzing at Europe’s borders, testing the patience of air defences, and the resolve of denial. Gaza reminds us that justice itself is selective, negotiable, and expendable when inconvenient.
The question isn’t whether history will judge. It’s whether history will still be listening by the time anyone speaks.
Caption: Ukrainian servicemen set up a ‘Vampire’ drone before flying it towards the position of the Russian troops, at an undisclosed location near the frontline in the Donetsk direction, Ukraine, 23 September 2025, amid the ongoing Russian invasion. Vampire is a drone bomber developed by Ukrainian company SkyFall, in production since 2022. EPA/SERGEY SHESTAK
Updated: September 25, 2025 - 17:13
