‘How Ukraine and Iran rewrote the rules of war’

This is apropos a letter to the Editor titled “How Ukraine and Iran rewrote the rules of war” carried by the newspaper yesterday. Russia entered Ukraine in February 2022 believing that its superior military power, larger population, greater economic resources and vast nuclear arsenal would quickly force Kyiv into submission. Instead, it became one of the most costly military miscalculations of modern times.

Russia possesses approximately 16.4 million square kilometers of territory, making it the largest country in the world. Ukraine covers roughly 579,000 square kilometers. Russia’s economy before the conflict exceeded $2.4 trillion, while Ukraine’s economy was only a fraction of that size. Russia enjoyed superiority in military manpower, industrial capacity, missile forces and strategic reserves.

Yet Ukraine refused to collapse. With substantial support from Europe and the United States, combined with extraordinary national determination, Ukraine transformed itself into one of the most innovative military forces in modern history. Ukrainian engineers, military planners and scientists pioneered large-scale drone warfare, integrated battlefield intelligence and precision long-range strikes. They demonstrated that innovation could compensate for numerical inferiority.

Copyright Business Recorder, 2026