Russian Defense Designer: Drone Warfare Has Ended the Era of Nuclear Invincibility

Ground, aerial, and maritime drones have effectively stripped away the "sacred status of the nuclear sword," Dmitry Kuzyakin, Chief Designer at the Center for Integrated Unmanned Solutions (CKBR), wrote in a column published by Izvestia.

Drone Warfare Is Changing the Role of Nuclear Weapons

Kuzyakin argues that, in the past, an attack by a non-nuclear state against a country possessing nuclear weapons was considered virtually impossible because of the latter's nuclear status.

In his view, the widespread deployment of unmanned technologies has fundamentally changed that reality.

"Should nuclear weapons be used against a regional power if, with the help of drones, it has driven your strongest fleet out of a key region of the world's oceans—the Persian Gulf?" Kuzyakin asks.

He describes this as an ongoing process of the "desacralization of the atom," which, he says, is unfolding in real time.

Broader Debate Over Nuclear Capabilities Continues

In May, Military Watch Magazine reported that Belarus possesses all the necessary infrastructure to store and maintain Russian nuclear weapons.

Earlier, in February, military analyst Alexei Leonkov stated that Ukraine no longer has the industrial capacity required to produce nuclear weapons.