Comment by nostrademons
6 hours ago
Arguably an even greater leverage point is to have the ability to select your enemy. Don't fight wars with belligerents that are 1000 miles away. Instead, fuel nationalist and separatist sentiments within elements of your adversaries that are much closer to them. Instead of having to fight your adversaries, get them to fight themselves, and destroy their country from within.
Russia is doing a masterful job doing this to the U.S. Biden's foreign policy also was pretty brilliant - get Russia bogged down in a quagmire with Ukraine, while supplying just enough weaponry to Ukraine to keep the war going but not enough to win it. Strategy is also used throughout the globe; see all the various proxy wars going on.
If the U.S. honestly wanted to have the best chance defeating China, the optimal strategy would probably to protect and fund Chinese billionaires political ambitions, so that they could provide a countervailing (and ultimately rivalrous) force to the ruling Communist Party.
The role of drones in this is largely in protecting supply lines and information collection/dissemination points. If you want to arm your enemy's adversary and give them a shot at challenging the ruling power structures in their country, you need to be able to get weapons and information to them.
> Russia is doing a masterful job doing this to the U.S. Biden's foreign policy also was pretty brilliant - get Russia bogged down in a quagmire with Ukraine, while supplying just enough weaponry to Ukraine to keep the war going but not enough to win it.
I would classify these as two different things - hybrid warfare and offshore balancing. But they are both tools that can create more strategic depth and push conflict further away.