• Ponmala

We are now witnessing a sea change in the way wars are being fought. Truly, David’s ingenuity is proving to be more than a match for Goliath’s gigantic build. Very much like David’s sling shot, Zelensky’s drone swarms are proving to be a nightmare for Putin. That haughty march into Ukraine has deprived Russia of its status as the world’s second most powerful military power. From a leading seller of military hardware, the war has reduced Russia to an arms buyer who depends on China, Iran and North Korea to equip its military, which has got bogged down in Ukraine for over two-and-half years. What’s more, Ukraine is regularly destroying the stockpiles of ammunition that Russia has stored in bunkers, using hi-tech drones. Russia did not waste much time to retaliate using Iranian drones on a vast scale. The Russia-Ukrainian war has thus largely become a battle of drones.

Battle tanks, armoured vehicles and air defence systems costing millions of dollars are being taken down by drones that can be bought off the shelf at a fraction of that cost. Ukraine’s water drones sank Russia’s mighty ships. So much so, both the countries are embarking on producing millions of drones at a frenetic pace. At the start of the war, Russia blocked Ukraine’s vital export of wheat by closing the Black Sea for ships that carried it. But, in no time, Ukraine came out with an ingenious solution to the blockade with its sea drones that have sunk Russia’s mighty warships and rendered its Black Sea Fleet totally ineffective. Thanks to the sea drones, it is now business as usual for Ukrainian wheat exports. Compared to the gigantic warships they have buried in the ocean or badly damaged, these sea drones are punier than Lilliputians and cost hardly anything. If at all Ukraine had to depend solely on the heavier weapons that its Western partners provided reluctantly in dribs and drabs, Russia would have easily achieved its aim of overrunning it in days. The courage, patriotism and love for democracy of the Ukrainian people, and above all their ingenious use of the humble drone, is making Russia sweat it out, suffering huge losses in man and machinery, to crawl into Ukraine at a snail’s space.

In another theatre of war, Israel stormed into Gaza with the aim wiping off Hamas in a matter of days or weeks, but they got bogged down in a maze of tunnels that crisscross the entire stretch of the Gaza strip. Hamas has taken the theatre of war that had expanded in modern times from land and sea to under the sea and in the air to under the ground. Even as the anniversary of Israel’s Gaza invasion is just days away, Israel is in no position to declare victory, let alone free the Israeli hostages who are kept hidden in the tunnels. Despite destroying all that is over ground with relentless bombardment, one wonders if Israel will ever win the underground war that it has to fight with the Hamas fighters who are willing to fight to the death, even as they attract more fighters who are all too willing to replace them.

Not to be found wanting in ingenuity, the Israelites have expanded the theatre of war into people’s pockets. They tricked the Hezbollah fighters of Lebanon into abandoning mobiles and replacing them with outdated pagers, which almost simultaneously exploded, maiming and blinding thousands and killing a couple of dozens of them. The following day, the walkie talkies they were carrying also exploded similarly. The Hezbollah are now fearful of carrying handheld electronic communication instruments of any kind, and so are the fighters and leaders of Israel’s arch-enemy Iran. This is a new theatre of war that can go out of hand and extend to the entire world, engulfing it in a fearsome hi-tech pandemic. Russia’s threat to use the nuclear bomb against Ukraine wouldn’t mean much in a scenario where electronic gadgets would explode in people’s homes, hands, pockets, and in work places.

Prophetic is this passage from The Confessions of a Jihadist, an English novel published eight years back: “The shastipoorthi celebration of Satsang Baba was due in six months. People in their thousands were expected to flock from all over the world to Baba’s ashram for the occasion. I would have to get infected with Ebola virus and go for the night darshans of the Baba ten days prior to the sashtipoorthi day, which would no doubt infect His Holiness with the virus. Baba’s devotees would have a once-in-life chance to embrace His Holiness on the occasion. That would ensure the spread of the deadly infection to the entire world and the death of all infidels and unfaithful believers. In all probability, I might die and be chosen for the joys of heaven, but all the other soldiers of Allah would be saved by the protective measures that would have been put in place for them by that time in Caliphate territory. A new world where only true worshippers of Allah lived would thus emerge in a very short time.” That is one more new form wars could take sooner than later.