Russia runs its drone war like most companies run AI: from the top. Ukraine runs its drone units like Amazon. Annoyingly, both are kinda working.
Moscow pooled its best crews into one elite center, Rubikon. Ukrainian troops told The New York Times its creation was a “turning point.”
But that isn’t what Ukraine did: They built a market. Drone units earn points for results caught on video and can spend them in a state-run store. (Ukrainians call the points “ye-baly,” a swear-word pun that means, “effed.”) This way, they try lots of approaches and automatically double down on the ones that work.
Which is better when?
Top-down wins when we know what works and need more of it, fast. A market wins when nobody knows what will work, the front line knows more than headquarters, and results are cheap to check. No video, no points, no investment in scale.
Too often, companies are doing top-down AI “redesign” exactly when nobody knows what will work. Or tools get picked by people who’ll never use them. Gallup says only 15% of U.S. workers use AI daily. Weird.
Ukraine’s market catches bad tech fast. Early AI-guided drones disappointed the units that bought them, so few wanted to keep paying. “I’d rather have three standard drones than one with onboard AI,” one operator said. No vendor can buy that review.
So headquarters quit being the personal shopper and became a pricing desk. When Kyiv wanted prisoners more than kills, it repriced. By late 2025, a capture earned 120 points and a kill earned 12. Wharton finds “hours saved” is still AI’s most-tracked metric. Maybe we’re overdue for a reprice.
As for autonomy? What works now is narrow: A person decides what and when to strike, and the machine flies the last stretch. Less Terminator, more parking assist. In a September ministry test, six of seven AI guidance systems hit a moving, lightly armored vehicle in two of three tries.
Until something works, hand out points, not mandates.
And expect some swearing.
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Sources:
“Russian Offensive Campaign Assessment, July 7, 2025,” Evans et al, Jul 2025
“Inside Rubicon: The Structure of Russia’s Elite Drone Center,” Lee et al, Jun 2026
“New ‘Amazon for War’ System Lets Ukrainian Troops Trade Combat Success for Drones,” Mykhailenko, Aug 2025
“Ukraine’s Drone War Gets Gamified: Why ‘Bonus Points for Kills’ Is More Than a Morale Booster,” Shevko, Jun 2025
“Ukrainian Computer Game-Style Drone Attack System Goes ‘Viral’,” Booth, Nov 2025
“Global Indicator: Artificial Intelligence,” Kemp, Jan 2026
“Why Ukraine’s AI Drones Aren’t a Breakthrough Yet,” Kirichenko, Jun 2025
“2026 AI Adoption Report: The Adaptive Advantage,” Korst et al, Oct 2026
“AI Drones in Ukraine: This Is Where We’re At,” Post, Oct 2025
“Ministry of Defence and Brave1 Conduct Large-Scale Testing of Drones with AI Guidance,” Ministry of Defence of Ukraine, Sep 2026