Ukraine

I've been saying this for months with my circle of buddies.

The slow, methodical SEAD is like drilling holes in a dam. Enough holes happen then catastrophic failure happens.

The drone war on the ground has changed ground combat, but air dominance for either side would completely change the balance of the fight. Great job Ukraine, slow and steady seems to be winning the race here.

Also losing the air war becomes a very slippery slope very quickly, the basic strategic mechanisms at play heavily favor the winner winning even harder the more they win.

A lone air defense system is just a target, it only becomes a counter when it is integrated in a network of supporting air defenses and other elements.

Once the sky is full of Ukrainian drones hunting down anything that dares to turn on a radar or present itself as an obstacle to Ukraine's relentless long range drone strikes, from directions Russia cannot even begin to predict where from.... not only has Russia fallen behind in a crucial element of the fight, they have been kicked out of the air war and had the door locked behind them so they can't get back in.

Another point, the more that drones are used to take out air defenses, the closer Ukrainian aviation can get to lob glide bombs on Russian positions, which also has a massive non-linear effect upon the frontline calculus.

yup. there's no quick replacements coming for those BUKs, and they're EXPENSIVE as fuuuuck. And russia may not even possess the tech required to replace them at this point.