{"id":33699,"date":"2026-08-26T15:24:07","date_gmt":"2026-08-26T15:24:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ukraine\/33699\/"},"modified":"2026-08-26T15:24:07","modified_gmt":"2026-08-26T15:24:07","slug":"first-fully-autonomous-drone-kill-ukraine-heralds-dystopian-future-of-untethered-weaponry-euobserver","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ukraine\/33699\/","title":{"rendered":"First fully-autonomous drone kill Ukraine heralds \u2018dystopian future of untethered weaponry\u2019 \u2013 EUobserver"},"content":{"rendered":"

\u201cWe cannot leave decisions on targets solely to AI; it would not be sufficiently responsible\u201d, a Ukrainian commander said.<\/p>\n

The role of artificial intelligence in Russia\u2019s war against Ukraine has long been debated.<\/p>\n

AI helps both armies map the frontline and subsequently analyse the satellite images collected. In some cases, it can handle tasks that previously required hundreds of people.<\/p>\n

It is also increasingly used in unmanned aircraft, especially in cooperation with human pilots during the final stage of an attack. There has now been a breakthrough on the Russian side \u2014 the New York Times reports<\/a> that its forces have, for the first time in Ukraine, killed using a drone which selected its own target using artificial intelligence.<\/p>\n

The US newspaper, citing Ukrainian authorities and independent experts, described this as a historic milestone that could foreshadow \u201ca dystopian future of weaponry untethered to humans\u201d.<\/p>\n

Drone had no antenna but American module inside<\/p>\n

\u201cIt is a risk for the whole world,\u201d Ukrainian colonel Serhiy Minaiev told the New York Times. He feared that within just a few years, we could be living in a world resembling the Terminator film.<\/p>\n

The attack took place in early July in Zaporizhzhia, southern Ukraine. According to experts interviewed by the NYT, Russian operators programmed a Molniya drone to fly towards a local petrol station.<\/p>\n

It then selected a precise target itself \u2014 apparently a propane tank. However, the drone crashed into a wall and the ensuing explosion killed three civilians, including a 19-year-old student.<\/p>\n

Ukrainian experts subsequently found a commercially available Nvidia Jetson Orin computer module in the wreckage of the destroyed drone. Crucially, it was not encrypted, allowing the Ukrainians to access its communications.<\/p>\n

Although Nvidia does not sell its modules in Russia, they can be purchased through intermediaries or via third countries.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

The same sophisticated modules, which cost at most a few hundred dollars, had previously been found in other drones and even in a new type of Russian S-71M Monochrome missile.<\/p>\n

Russia has been testing<\/a> drones fitted with the Nvidia Jetson Orin module in Zaporizhzhia since May.<\/p>\n

The destroyed unmanned aircraft had no antenna through which it could communicate with its operators. Ukrainian Telegram channels reported<\/a> as early as the beginning of July that similar antenna-less Molniya drones had been found in Zaporizhzhia.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\u201cWe cannot leave decisions on targets solely to AI; it would not be sufficiently responsible\u201d, a Ukrainian commander…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":33700,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[13,22,11789,19,11786,6175,11784,6173,11787,17,20,11785,6174,11788,18,21],"class_list":["post-33699","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-news","tag-typedefinedterm","tag-identifier24","tag-identifier4056","tag-identifier4308","tag-identifier4383","tag-identifier4391","tag-nameai","tag-namedefence","tag-namefeature","tag-namerussia","tag-nameukraine","tag-termcodeai","tag-termcodedefence","tag-termcodefeature","tag-termcoderussia","tag-termcodeukraine"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ukraine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33699","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ukraine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ukraine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ukraine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ukraine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=33699"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ukraine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33699\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ukraine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/33700"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ukraine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=33699"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ukraine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=33699"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ukraine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=33699"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}