The trench warfare and heavy artillery on Ukraine\u2019s battlefields in 2022 don\u2019t look much like the war by air and sea that began when the United States and Israel attacked Iran.<\/p>\n
But similarities between the two conflicts soon became evident and remain so almost three months later.<\/p>\n
In both, the country with the more powerful military has been unable to vanquish its adversary. President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia expected a quick victory when he launched his \u201cspecial military operation,\u201d more than four years ago. President Trump initially vowed that the \u201clittle excursion\u201d<\/a> against Iran, which started on Feb. 28, would last four to five weeks<\/a>.<\/p>\n \u201cFor both Russia and for the United States, there\u2019s a lot of unmet expectations about their military operations,\u201d said Nicole Grajewski, an expert on Iran and Russia and a professor at Sciences Po, the elite social sciences university in Paris, attributing it to \u201cthe hubris on both sides.\u201d<\/p>\n Over the last several days, negotiations have produced progress toward an initial plan for peace between Iran and the United States, though with much uncertainty, given the renewed American strikes against Iran on Monday. Whether or not an agreement is reached, the war will have provided lessons, along with the conflict in Ukraine, on the evolution of modern warfare.<\/p>\n Technology reshaping warfare<\/p>\n Asymmetrical tactics have helped both Ukraine and Iran hold off stronger forces with which they could not compete in a conventional miliary confrontation.<\/p>\n Iran, for instance, struck at the United States by attacking its allies. It instilled fear in Persian Gulf states by sending one-way attack drones to hit military bases and energy facilities in countries like Kuwait and Saudi Arabia. It has also used the threat of mines and small armed speedboats to keep a chokehold on the narrow Strait of Hormuz.<\/p>\n Ukraine has assassinated Russian military officials<\/a> in Moscow and regularly struck oil facilities, the lifeblood of the Russian economy. It has also used sea drones to neutralize Russia\u2019s much bigger Black Sea navy.<\/p>\n Perhaps most indelibly, experts said, the two conflicts demonstrate how innovation and technology are reshaping warfare.<\/p>\n The United States has turned to drone-detecting systems<\/a> loaded with artificial intelligence to protect the Prince Sultan Air Base in Saudi Arabia, according to a person familiar with the agreement. Those systems were developed by Ukraine to defend itself from Russia.<\/p>\n In Lebanon, the militant group Hezbollah is attacking Israeli troops with explosive drones controlled by fiber-optic cables, like those commonly used in the war in Ukraine.<\/p>\n Layered systems of sensors, guided missiles and drones \u2014 and, in many cases, A.I.-enabled technology \u2014 that were honed in Ukraine and deployed in the Gulf, \u201care likely to rapidly proliferate around the world,\u201d said Michael Kofman, a military expert and senior fellow in the Russia and Eurasia Program at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.<\/p>\n In both wars, \u201cwe see the advent of mass precision on the battlefield,\u201d Mr. Kofman said. Already, he said, Hezbollah and combatants in Mali have turned to similarly cheap and easily built technology, showing that such systems \u201cwill democratize access to mass precision on the battlefield for middle and small powers.\u201d <\/p>\n Similar attack strategies<\/p>\n The fighting in the Middle East before the cease-fire took effect in early April featured the kind of drone swarms combined with<\/a> ballistic missile attacks that officials and experts said debuted in Russia\u2019s invasion<\/a> of Ukraine.<\/p>\n Iran delivered one-way Shahed attack drones to Russia in 2022, which Moscow used to strike Ukraine. That same model has been launched against Gulf countries by Iran this year as Russia is returning the favor with some military support to Iran. The extent of that support remains unclear, but according to U.S. officials, it includes shipping drone parts across the Caspian Sea.<\/p>\n Ms. Grajewski noted \u201csome cooperation\u201d between Russia and Iran in manipulating global location systems to confuse the opposition\u2019s targeting guidance. Some ships linked to Iran appear to have recently spoofed locator trackers<\/a> in the Strait of Hormuz \u2014 mirroring a long-honed tactic of Russia\u2019s illicit shadow fleet of energy tankers \u2014 to evade detection by the U.S. Navy.<\/p>\n Russian anti-jamming equipment was found<\/a> in an Iranian drone targeting a British base in Cyprus in March. European officials and experts are concerned Moscow will supply weapons<\/a> if stalled peace talks break down and Iran resumes strikes across the region.<\/p>\n \u201cWe\u2019ve seen evidence of Russia helping Iran with its attacks,\u201d the British defense minister, John Healey, said in April at a meeting of allies who are sending military support to Ukraine.<\/p>\n He did not describe that evidence but added, \u201cPutin wanted us distracted by the conflict in the Middle East.\u201d<\/p>\n Diplomatic ties<\/p>\n The Iran war has strained some alliances, most notably between the Trump administration and Europe, where many leaders believe the conflict is unnecessary and unlawful.<\/p>\n It has also set off a worldwide scramble for energy supplies, with some countries turning to Russia for illicit but available oil and gas. And it has delayed the Russia-Ukraine peace process by diverting the United States\u2019 attention to the Middle East.<\/p>\n \u201cI believe they were drinking Champagne in the Kremlin when President Trump started the war in Iran,\u201d said Danylo Lubkivsky, director of the Kyiv Security Forum and a former Ukrainian deputy foreign minister.<\/p>\n But the war in Iran has also produced some surprising alliances, most evident in the new partnerships Ukraine has forged with Gulf states.<\/p>\n In April, Ukraine announced new security agreements with Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates. Those kinds of ties would have been unlikely several years ago when some of those Gulf states had previously sought to maintain neutral relations with Russia.<\/p>\n Kyiv wants to trade its drone technology and training assistance in return for Middle East diplomatic backing, energy deals and advanced air-defense systems, said Jana Kobzova, co-director of the European Security Program at the European Council on Foreign Relations.<\/p>\n President Volodymyr Zelensky is hoping \u201cto turn this crisis into an opportunity,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n At the least, Ms. Kobzova said, agreements with oil-rich states that include the sale of drone technology to them could prove lucrative to Ukraine\u2019s burgeoning defense industry.<\/p>\n Europe has been a lifeline for Ukraine since the United States mostly stopped donating weapons and equipment to Kyiv last year.<\/p>\n