All the military experience of the last century is simply irrelevant!

All the military experience of the last century is simply irrelevant!

OLEKSANDRA MATVIICHUK

Yesterday (11th July, 2026), at a meeting of the Global Foresight Council in Paris, we discussed security. War has changed dramatically over the past five years. At the start of the full-scale invasion, I refused to evacuate and remained in Kyiv, which the Russians were trying to encircle. Back then, the war took the form of a column of Russian tanks storming my city. But today, it’s a completely different war.

It’s a war of unmanned vehicles, the use of AI, massive drone attacks, complete battlefield transparency, and rapid-fire long-range weapons. All the military experience of the last century is simply irrelevant.

Today, it’s not just military power that takes center stage, but a society’s capacity for resistance. You can have modern equipment and weapons, but if the country lacks people willing to defend it, that won’t help you much. Likewise, if the people on the home front are unable to withstand the onslaught of war, even the most experienced army cannot hold back the enemy without support from the home front.

Russia, You won’t break us

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This winter, with temperatures at minus 25 degrees, millions of people in Ukraine lived without heat, electricity, or water. It’s hard for me to convey just how difficult it was. But all the banks were open, parliament held sessions, classes took place in schools, and hospitals performed surgeries. This is what the world calls Ukrainian resilience. But in reality, this is “total defense” itself. When a simple action becomes an act of resistance.

Oleksandra Matviichuk: ‘I have a question’!

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People matter. Without working with people – those who take their freedom and security for granted – neither a powerful economy, nor military potential, nor even nuclear weapons will save developed democracies. Because if you are rich and weak, in a world where the international system of peace and security is dysfunctional, you will be plundered.

UKRAINE: Putin has increased the number of attacks!

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And I see almost no frank discussion of this in developed democracies. Only a few countries stand as rare exceptions. In the rest, a psychological mechanism of denial dominates – the idea that “we are unique, so something like that simply cannot happen to us.”

Headline Image: iottechnews.com

Oleksandra Matviichuk is a human rights defender who works on issues in Ukraine and the OSCE region. She heads the human rights organisation Center for Civil Liberties, which was awarded the 2022 Nobel Peace Prize.

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