By Pankaj Phanase
Clausewitz famously stated, “War is nothing but a duel on a larger scale. It is a physical contest between people where each side uses force to oblige enemy to do things at their will.” Since his time, the nature, purpose, and course of war have transformed dramatically. Gone are the days when war represented the final act of the struggle for existence. Today, it has become a complex task of multidimensional activity with multiple tactics. The rise of asymmetric warfare, the formation of alliances and counter-alliances, and the limited nature of modern conflicts have taken the scope of war far beyond just survival. One need not mobilise an entire resource and yield maximum efficiency when the dominant side really has the power to dictate the entire course of a conflict for the winner. Such a luxury enables the dominant parties to go beyond political objectives to economic objectives in the wars. When such a party is technologically superior, the course of war reaches the war platform, turning into platforms for testing new technologies and strategies, effectively transforming battlefields into experimental labs. The limited wars of the 21st century, such as the Russia-Ukraine and the Israel-Hamas conflict, need to be assessed through this perspective.
When the war was escalated by Putin in 2022, it was thought of as a matter of time before the fall of Ukraine. But, Ukraine captivated its allies and observers alike with its remarkable technological capacity to counter Russia’s aggression. The use of smart phones by both the combatants and noncombatants has brought transformation in command, control, communications, computing, intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (C4ISR) on the battlefield. The monitoring capability of Ukrainian software bugs can easily penetrate Russian computers, tablets and phones, which make them GPS guides for Zelensky’s army. is followed by small, plastic drones, buzzing quietly overhead, dropping grenades and other ordnance on Russian troops. 3D printers are able to manufacture spare parts in such a way that maintenance of heavy equipment could be done in the war field itself. Further, ordinary pickup trucks are transformed into the mobile missile launchers by the engineers.
Beyond testing new technologies, Ukraine has shown that even existing technologies can be pushed to their limits to determine their effectiveness. For example, the U.S. and its allies have been keenly observing how well their weapons perform under the stresses of combat and analysing the types of ammunition each side employs. One prominent example is the effectiveness of Russia's use of inexpensive drones supplied by Iran, which have proven effective in targeting Ukraine’s electrical grid. Western military observers have noted how Ukrainian success has largely been attributed to the American-made HIMARS (High Mobility Artillery Rocket System), which has played a decisive role in stalling Russian advances. However, some high-profile systems provided to the Ukrainians, such as the Switchblade 300 drone, have not performed as well as expected, teaching valuable lessons about their durability and maintenance requirements in high-intensity warfare.
The innovation definitely entered a new phase when it came to the Israel-Hamas war, which escalated after the Hamas attack on October 7, 2023. Israel has shown tremendous superiority over its adversary in three ways. First, unconventional methods of intelligence gathering and targeted killings have revolutionised its warfare. The extensive use of Artificial Intelligence (AI) has become a game-changer. The Israeli military, using an AI system known as “Lavender”,identified tens of thousands of “human targets” for assassination based on their suspected affiliation with Hamas or the Palestinian Islamic terrorist groups. Once these targets were selected, another AI-based system called “Where’s Daddy?” was employed to track them, often resulting in the killing of entire families and nearby neighbours. Another AI system, “Habsora”, has been used to identify and destroy buildings and facilities that are purportedly used for military purposes. The second is manufacturing and deployment of ultramodern weapons. The army only used unguided missiles, sometimes referred to as "dumb" bombs (as opposed to “smart” precision bombs), which have the ability to destroy entire buildings, causing a lot of casualties, when it came to targeting the alleged junior militants identified by ‘Lavender’. This exercise is the outcome of the logic of cost-cutting in warfare, which has reduced human lives to mere numbers, leading to the deaths of hundreds of women and children in Gaza.
Third, the transformation of the conventional artillery to unconventional levels. The 1980 Convention on Certain Conventional Weapons prohibits the use of lethal weapons on civilian populations. Hence, Israel has developed weapons that appear less lethal on the surface, but cause significant harm. The new precision-guided 120mm mortar bomb called the Iron Sting is a powerful weapon in urban warfare because it can pierce double-reinforced concrete. The Palestinian people have suffered severe injuries as a result of the Israeli army’s testing of rubber bullets, robotic guns with artificial intelligence, and various crowd dispersal techniques. The nature of the wounds disguises the lethality of these bullets. Surgeons noticed that the limbs after the wound appear intact, but it is difficult to distinguish between bone and soft tissues. Hence, superficial wounds reveal severe internal damage, making these weapons exceptionally dangerous.
Finally, the IDF’s ability to expand the war beyond borders to initiate manipulation of information. Images from the Israel-Hamas conflict have painfully and graphically demonstrated AI’s ability to be used as a propaganda tool to produce realistic depictions of bloodshed. Since the beginning of the war, social media has been circulating digitally manipulated photographs that have been used to mislead people about atrocities that never happened or to create false reports of casualties. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu posted a set of pictures on X during the early stages of the conflict, describing them as “horrifying photos of babies murdered and burned” by Hamas. Ben Shapiro, a conservative commentator, came under fire for allegedly disseminating artificial intelligence-generated content after he enlarged one of the images on X. On the battlefield itself, IDF has deployed drones making sounds of babies crying, which forced the civil population to come out during the night, resulting in enhanced and target identification programmed in ‘Lavender’. The superiority of the Israeli technicians has deceived AI checking tools.
Wars after the 2020s have introduced novel weapons, frontiers, and techniques, pushing the boundaries of battlefield innovation and allowing for the real-time deployment and testing of these advancements in combat. In the Syrian conflict, Russia used the space to demonstrate its weapons and access the global arms market. Now Ukraine and Israel replicating this manoeuvre to advanced levels. The limited and deceived lethality of the weapons combined with psychological techniques makes it hard to bring these innovations under radar. China is definitely taking notes for its potential technological spectacle in Taiwan or elsewhere in the neighbourhood. Thus, modern battlefields are no longer just theatres of conflict— they have become testing grounds where new technologies are forged, pushing the boundaries of warfare and redefining the rules of engagement for future generations.
This Article is an Original Contribution to the SIS Blog
Pankaj Fanase is a Doctoral Candidate at the Centre for International Politics, Organisation, and Disarmament (CIPOD) at Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi. His thesis focuses on the impact of digital competition on great power politics and their strategic thinking.