I joined the army on the day of the Russian invasion. I鈥檇 studied computer science and only recently landed a great internship at a game company. But I saw the news and knew my options were to sit and wait for them to come and kill me or go running into the fight.

Comparing the early days of the war to now, it鈥檚 like two different worlds. Back then there were drones, but most of the damage was still done by artillery. Now, drones are everywhere, from the front line all the way back 30 kilometres. It鈥檚 terrifying because you used to be able to come a little way back from the fighting for rest and feel completely safe. Now, danger is always looming over you, wherever you are.

I occasionally have the chance to get back to Kyiv and then I feel like I鈥檓 not losing my mind quite as fast as usual. It鈥檚 a partial respite because on the front line we work 24 hours a day and the non-stop fighting is hugely draining, but you鈥檙e still aware of the risk of drone strikes even in Kyiv. You just can鈥檛 escape it.聽

On the front line, we spend 90 per cent of our time underground in bunkers because of the threat of enemy drones. Every time you go outside, you risk being spotted and killed. The conditions are like camping, but it obviously has a very different vibe.

I鈥檝e done a lot of different jobs as a drone pilot, but at the end of the day, the mission was always to protect our ground troops. I spent time as a reconnaissance drone pilot, then flying bomber drones and now I鈥檓 doing anti-drone missions in a regiment called Aquila under the control of the 3rd Army Corps.

We specialise in shooting down everything from small first-person view (FPV) drones to the long-range kamikaze models heading for Ukraine鈥檚 cities. We鈥檝e got short-range anti-aircraft guns, shoulder-launched rockets and drones. But I鈥檓 in a small unit that does drone-to-drone warfare in the skies above the front line.

I鈥檓 proud to say that I鈥檓 a top performer not just in my regiment but in the wider army. I think it鈥檚 because I鈥檝e been doing it for a long time, but I鈥檝e taken out 932 enemy drones. Right now I focus on finding smaller FPV drones that are doing reconnaissance or hunting our troops with explosives, and take them out before they can do any damage.

Russians often find our positions on the front line and target them with drones and artillery. We get information from our guys that they鈥檙e being hunted and we try to take out Russian drones before they can do any damage. Most of the time we find them.

I remember one time we were retaking a village that the Russians had occupied. In a single day, we erased all the progress they鈥檇 made in a year, and we drone pilots were helping cover the guys that were advancing on the ground. There was a soldier wounded, and the Russians were trying to bomb him with a drone. At the last minute, we found it, we hit it and the guy is alive because of that. It鈥檚 an amazing feeling.聽

Spotting those tiny drones among miles of open land is as much an art as a science. You need to be able to put yourself in the shoes of the enemy pilot who鈥檚 out hunting for your comrades, imagine what interests them, where they鈥檒l be looking. You need to hunt him.

We have a few distinct jobs in my team. Some assemble and arm drones, others pilot them and there are also navigators who direct us to the enemy and keep meticulous logs of what hardware we get through and which targets we take out. Even though we have specialities, we make sure we can all step into any role in case someone is injured.

On my most recent trip to the front line, we hit 180 targets in 20 days. But there are also missions where you don鈥檛 spot a target, run low on battery and have to return, so it can be up to 30 flights per day.

We鈥檝e all seen the advanced interceptors and various other drones that Ukraine produces, and they are used for all sorts of missions, but most of the drones that I fly, and also that I shoot down, are commercially available models. They鈥檙e cheap and they鈥檙e available 鈥� they鈥檙e good enough for war. Both we and the Russians buy the same Chinese models 鈥� that鈥檚 the world that we live in. I鈥檝e shot down so many of them and they still keep coming.聽

We work in what used to be beautiful countryside, beautiful cities, that real people lived in. That people had made their own. Now it鈥檚 all destroyed. But you can still see so much potential for this land to bring so much happiness and fulfilment to people. It鈥檚 disheartening, and heartbreaking, to be perfectly honest.

The war is horrible, it鈥檚 horrid, it鈥檚 everything that you imagine it being, but it鈥檚 also a very unique experience. It鈥檚 the sort of experience that foreigners usually only see in movies. The stakes are so high that everything you do matters. Everything you do has a weight to it. It changes your perspective, and you see so many people die and get injured that you begin to realise that every moment that you鈥檙e alive, every person that you meet, everything that you do, is important. You could die at any moment. Every moment that you live is important. We don鈥檛 get to choose what happens to us, we just get to choose what we do with that.

I used to be much more angry with the Russians, I think. I used to be much more emotional about it. I鈥檓 getting to a point now where I鈥檓 trying to find my inner peace.

Killing the enemy, from some points of view, it鈥檚 horrible. But if you don鈥檛 take care of them, if you don鈥檛 kill them, they advance towards our troops and then they have to deal with them, and that鈥檚 not fair.聽

I鈥檓 not sure what I鈥檓 going to do after the war. It鈥檚 a very demanding job, both physically and psychologically, and it takes much from you. When the war ends, yes, you鈥檒l get this freedom, but what to do with this freedom is not a question you get to ponder while you鈥檙e still serving. I鈥檒l find some way to keep myself busy.

As told to Matthew Sparkes

For years, we have had unconfirmed reports and rumours that AI-controlled weapons have killed soldiers on the battlefield without a human in the loop. Now, we know it has happened.

As we report here, the use of autonomous killers in a test exercise marks a watershed in warfare. But we shouldn鈥檛 be surprised. The technology has existed for some time and humans have never invented a weapon and then refrained from using it.

That doesn鈥檛 mean we can鈥檛 reverse course. The logic for a ban on autonomous weapons is simple: deploying AI without human oversight risks weapons accidentally targeting troops on the wrong side or even civilians. What鈥檚 more, ethicists say that such weapons deprive combatants of their dignity, make war too easy to wage and muddy the waters when it comes to responsibility for lethal action.

But if we are to ban these weapons, just as we have done with cluster bombs and lasers designed to blind soldiers, we should have acted before they arrived, not after. The United Nations has been in talks to ban fully autonomous weapons for over a decade, but according to the Human Rights Watch campaign group, India, Israel, Russia and the US have vetoed the discussions.

Humans have never invented a weapon and then refrained from using it

The framework to ban autonomous weapons already exists 鈥� they could easily be added to the list of excessively injurious or indiscriminate arms proscribed by the UN Convention on Certain Conventional Weapons. More difficult to reckon with is the fact that these drones can be made with inexpensive parts ordered online and some open-source software. Any
tech-literate teenager could do it.

As we explore here, the war in Ukraine has made it clear that robots will dominate future battlefields. The question the world must now answer is whether a human should always be involved, ultimately responsible for the decision to pull the trigger, or whether machines can be allowed to act alone. Whichever we choose, a decision must be made before the technology proliferates.

A nuclear war would not only trigger a nuclear winter, but also severely damage the ozone layer, making recovery even harder. Now, a study has shown that a relatively small nuclear war between India and Pakistan could do just as much damage to the ozone layer as a larger nuclear war between the US and Russia.

鈥淲e want to emphasise that even a small-scale nuclear war can produce far-reaching global side effects beyond the conflict regions,鈥� says at the University of Quebec in Montreal.

A nuclear war would devastate the areas where bombs or warheads explode, with the explosions, heat and radiation potentially killing many millions directly. The explosions and fires would be so large that huge quantities of smoke would be pumped into the atmosphere, blocking sunlight and causing global temperatures to plummet 鈥� a nuclear winter.

鈥淭here鈥檚 strong surface cooling in the first several years,鈥� says Zhuo, who presented her team鈥檚 results at a meeting of the European Geosciences Union in Vienna last month.

For instance, a 2007 study estimated that a billion people could die of starvation as a result of a nuclear winter caused by a war between India and Pakistan.

Recovery from a nuclear winter would be delayed by damage to the ozone layer in the stratosphere that blocks harmful ultraviolet light 鈥� volcanic eruptions and even large wildfires can also damage the ozone layer. High UV levels can harm plants as well as animals, meaning lower yields from farming even as temperatures recover.

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Recent studies with advanced climate models suggest . So, concerned by the many conflicts around the world, Kuo and her colleagues decided to look at the possible consequences if one went nuclear. Drawing on estimates from previous studies, they modelled an India-Pakistan nuclear war that would release 5 million tonnes of soot into the atmosphere and a US-Russia war releasing 16 million tonnes. Unlike previous studies, they also took into account other pollutants such as organic carbon.

Their climate model suggests that air circulation patterns in the tropics would allow the pollutants from an India-Pakistan war to rise higher into the atmosphere, stay there longer and spread more widely around the world.

鈥淭he upward transport is stronger for the tropical cases,鈥� Kuo says. So although the quantities of pollutants are smaller than from a US-Russia war, the effects on the ozone layer are actually greater.

The damage to the ozone layer would be greatest over the poles, similar to the situation caused by ozone-damaging pollutants known as CFCs. But there could be an increase in UV levels of up to 30 per cent even in tropical areas, the model suggests, with serious impacts on the health of people and wildlife.