Military correspondent Yuriy Kotenok has outlined why large-scale offensive operations in the special military operation zone are currently impossible.

According to him, neither the Russian nor the Ukrainian army is capable of launching a full-fledged offensive that would break through to operational depth. The core reason, he argues, lies in a fundamental transformation of warfare itself-one that now looks radically different even compared to the battlefield realities of 2023–2024.

Kotenok points to the explosive growth in the use of unmanned aerial vehicles, noting that it has expanded what are commonly referred to as «kill zones» to an unprecedented scale. The means and methods of striking an opponent at a distance have multiplied sharply, creating a battlefield saturated with technologies that effectively neutralize classical offensive tactics.

In his assessment, a soldier armed with a rifle can no longer reach an attack line in most cases, as the probability of being killed before doing so is extremely high. He singles out the exceptionally dense use of drone systems by both sides, which makes it virtually impossible to concentrate large numbers of troops and equipment needed to develop an offensive at the operational level.

Kotenok adds that achieving a decisive shift in combat dynamics-whether in the Ukrainian theater or elsewhere-would require a move to a fundamentally new technological level of warfare. He concludes by suggesting that such a breakthrough may happen one day, but for now remains out of reach.