Last Sunday, the operation "Spider's Web" carried out secretly by Ukraine by entering inside the Russian territory, destroyed Russian warplanes and caused billions of dollars in damages. Russia's use of common drones, which cost around $600 apiece, has cost Russia hundreds of millions of dollars. That is why this attack has been discussed as a new defining moment of modern warfare.

On Sunday, around 1 a.m. local time, strange reports of explosions began to be received at airports 3,000 miles away from Ukraine. First, there were reports of explosions at airfields in Siberia. Then everyone's attention began to focus on how the attack was being carried out. After that, the videos of the attack started to become public.

that was really weird. Because everyone was used to attacks by Ukrainian drones following long-range targets inside Russia. But here in Russia, small 'quadcopters' could be seen flying from trucks parked on the side of the road. They then collided with a fighter jet parked at the airfield and a video of the burning aircraft was released. This attack was very different from the previous ones. The attack is known as one of the surprising events of the Russia-Ukraine war.

It was a quick and precise response from Ukraine, which was on the defensive after the outbreak of war with Russia. A subtle and highly secretive plan to boost its own courage was successful in Kiev, which was bombarded by long-range Russian missiles. 

The same warplanes fired missiles from Russian territory at various important targets inside Ukraine. In addition, long-range surface-to-surface missiles were fired from sea-based warships, submarines, and inside Russia. All of that would have been beyond the reach of the Ukrainians.

Russian bombings in Ukraine were so regular that Ukrainians knew when to enter bunkers long before a missile hit. As soon as a Russian warplane was ready to take off from an airbase in the interior of Russia, Ukrainians received an alert on their mobile phones.

The Ukrainians then had about two hours before those planes fired the missiles. An alarm was sounded when the missiles were launched after reaching the designated point. If the target were Kiev, depending on where the launch came from, the Ukrainians would have about two to three hours. It's like a live attack 'count down' on the phone.

Almost all Ukrainians were familiar with these Tu-95 bombers. In the past, Ukrainians felt safe because of American Patriot missiles and other military assistance. However, they were vulnerable to the Tu-95 as American support had almost ceased for some time. Because there are very few weapons systems that can truly defeat Russia's advanced missiles. And Ukraine never had enough of them. As the US retreated, it became even less so.

So Ukrainians were learning to adapt on their own since the start of the war with Russia. It was both a necessity and a compulsion for them. It was also important for them to innovate in war. Which proves to be less expensive but more deadly. The answer was the use of drones.

Ukraine has not used drones before to show its determination in a war against its much larger military power, Russia. It's hard to imagine how Ukraine would have waged war without drones. In the last three years, they have transformed the way they fight and the entire battlefield. The Ukrainians have managed to maintain a largely defensive position using drones despite having fewer men to fight them. 

A Ukrainian stationed on the front lines of the war was forced to sit every day watching Russian missiles and bombs hit the city where his family lived. They were diligently engrossed in finding some way to stop it. Ukraine began building long-range drones under a new type of drone program. They could fly hundreds of miles carrying powerful explosives. It was first fired by Ukraine in December 2022 at a Russian airfield. Russia was used to this new capability of Ukraine.  Along with the

, Russia's air defenses were also strong. They also found new ways to blunt the Ukrainian offensive. Built forts around the airport fuel depot. Prepared fake fighter jets to confuse the Ukrainians as to what and where. Even though there was an explosion at the airport, tires were placed on the wings of the plane so that the shrapnel would not damage the plane.

So about a year and a half ago, Ukrainians felt the need to try something different. And, they made this super secret plan. The Ukrainians kept the plan so secret that they didn't even tell the Americans. They began looking for ways to keep these small drones close to airfields with Russian bombers. A

that would allow a lethal strike to succeed before the Russians are aware of it and a relative decline in the bombing of Ukraine. The operation was so high-level that Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky himself oversaw it. This was the name of the Ukrainian secret military operation - "Spider's Web". In order for the

operation to be successful, these drones first had to be secretly deployed near airfields in the interior of Russia. so that it can hit the bombers there. Training was then required to perform lethal strikes on targets from drones.

The Ukrainians used the most convenient and unsuspicious shipping containers inside Russian territory to hide the drones. The Ukrainians turned these metal boxes that run seamlessly along highways into a sophisticated weapons delivery system. Russian 'popping doll' where a large doll has a small doll inside and a smaller doll inside.

was another container within a similar container. The roof of the upper container opened by remote control and contained the drones and the mechanism that operated them inside. After reaching the designated location, the drones could fly in the sky and be ready to strike the target as soon as the attack signal was received.

According to President Zelensky's claim, they established the headquarters of this operation across the street from the building of the Russian Internal Security Service (FSB). They conducted this whole plan secretly inside Russia. The Russian secret police could throw stones at that place. Ukrainian agents entered Russia with a purpose and high morale.

Their primary targets were bombers only. For this attack, they developed such software for the drones, so that they could do more damage to the bombers. To that end, they symbolically used Soviet-era bombers in a museum in central Ukraine. Which turned out to be very useful for this operation.

They used some sophisticated 'machine-learning artificial intelligence algorithms' that had been tested and developed throughout the war. That enabled the drone to basically hit the bomber's weakest point, where the fuel was stored.

At 1:60 p.m. on Sunday, the green flag for drone attacks was displayed and these drones started flying over the roof of the container. Then the explosions began targeting specific targets. In no time, smoke began to rise from the airfield. At the same time, drones flying from containers attacked important airfields in various parts of Russia.

Immediately after the attack, the drone pilots saw the video in real time. which proved the success of the attack. According to Ukrainian claims, they destroyed 41 warplanes. That equates to about $7 billion. If even half of the planes were destroyed than what Ukraine claims, that is a loss equal to 3.5 billion dollars. 

In this attack, Russia has lost about one-third of its total military capabilities capable of killing with nuclear bombs. Even if only 10 or 20 planes were destroyed, not as many as Ukraine says, that's a lot. Because Russia is estimated to have only around 100 such aircraft and they are not even building such aircraft in recent years.