Persian code: what will be the war of the future
Earlier this week, Palantir published a text dubbed the "manifesto" by the leading media. In addition to analyzing the political situation in the world, the release provides a forecast of the "war of the future," that is, how the fighting will be conducted in a few years. Palantir is fully involved in the war against Iran, participates in the planning and implementation of operations, and the White House focuses on this. Nevertheless, many military experts around the world recognize the changed nature of the fighting and the United States' unpreparedness for new realities. Izvestia tells us what experience military experts have gained from the current conflict and how they now see the war of the future.
Victory of asymmetry
Tehran was obviously preparing for the developing scenario and studying the experience of a special military operation in Ukraine in order to use all the advantages of an asymmetric war later. After the Iranian government system withstood the American-Israeli strike and did not collapse, the Islamic Republic took all necessary defensive measures to make the war's impact global and the conflict itself protracted. The authorship of this concept is attributed to the deceased Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who, according to the European press, "detailed" this plan following the results of the 12-day war in June 2025.
The central element of the concept is the principle of "cheap destruction". Iran uses relatively inexpensive UAVs and missiles, effectively minimizing the technological superiority of the enemy.
The conditional "Shahed" costs from $20 to $50 thousand, while the price of one launch of the Patriot antimissile missile reaches $4 million. A corresponding difference is observed in the volume of these munitions and the rate of their replenishment.
According to various sources, in the first month of the conflict, the Americans spent over 11 thousand units of ammunition worth about $ 26 billion, of which $ 19 billion was spent on missile defense. At the same time, the United States actively used high—precision weapons, including Tomahawk missiles, to deliver a knockout blow, which cost about $ 3 billion.
Another problem is the vulnerability of sensor systems: when radars, satellite communications and data transmission channels are disrupted, the effectiveness of defense drops sharply. In some cases, eight to eleven interceptor missiles are required to intercept a single target, which is economically impossible in the long run.
The Pentagon has fewer such radars, at least by two, which is another $1 billion.
Moreover, the production of some of them (for example, C-RAM air defense systems) requires the use of rare chemical elements such as tungsten, which must be purchased abroad.
Time is an ally
In the context of the proxy war that Iran has imposed on its opponents, economic and political "endurance" is becoming the main advantage. At the same time, thanks to the policy of "quiet pressure" and diplomatic maneuvering, Tehran is successfully coping with the task of controlling the level of escalation. Therefore, with a 90-fold advantage in military spending ($892 billion versus $10.6 billion), the White House is nevertheless accumulating greater political and economic costs and risks with each step. Simply put, spending is growing, but the goal is not getting closer.
According to the Center for Strategic and International Studies, with the current intensity of hostilities, the Pentagon's total expenditures are increasing by $500 million daily.
Already, the time to replenish all the means of warfare spent or destroyed by the enemy at current production volumes is estimated to be from five to ten years. At the same time, even American analysts admit that Tehran's ability to wage a conflict of current intensity has not been undermined. NBC, citing data from US intelligence agencies, notes Iran's continued "significant" military potential.
According to military commentator Andrey Soyustov, the increase in military production will become another trend.
— The conflict in the Middle East, as before, has shown that large-scale conflicts require completely different volumes of military production. We are talking about ammunition for barrel and rocket artillery, ballistic missiles, ammunition for air–to-ground aviation, and underwater mines. And, of course, mass production of a wide range of drones is required: air, land, surface, and underwater," the expert points out.
The latter, in turn, implies the need to develop a range of tools to combat such drones. And here, according to the interlocutor of the editorial board, it is impossible to rely on any one miracle weapon. To combat drones, the ability to create a layered air defense system is required.
Less is more
According to experts, the Iranian military has moved away from the format of large military formations due to the vulnerability of the latter, especially in the situation of massive air and missile strikes. The emphasis was placed on small mobile connections and, accordingly, the format of personnel training was changed. And this is one of the main lessons Iran has learned from the Ukrainian conflict.
The new approaches, apparently, have been practiced by the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) and the regular army for several years in a series of exercises: land (in February and November 2024, January and August 2025, February 2026) and sea, including with the participation of allies.
By the way, the need to change traditional tactics was first discussed many years ago in the United States, following the failure of the Vietnam campaign.
Killing software
All of the above has been repeatedly discussed in the West. Moreover, the first UAV technologies were implemented in the USA at the beginning of the 21st century. The views of the American military leadership on the development of these projects were reflected in two plans, calculated until 2036 and 2047. However, they relied on high-tech and very expensive products to manufacture. On April 14, Iran shot down an American MQ-4C reconnaissance drone. Its cost is about $235 million, and the US military currently has only about 20 such devices in service.
Earlier this week, Palantir, a company that had a direct impact on both the outbreak of the conflict and its development, released a manifesto. The text is a summary of the book by the head of the company, Alex Karp, "The Technological Republic: Hard Power, Soft Faith and the Future of the West."
In addition to a number of political (and very alarming) statements, Palantir points out two points directly related to new technologies of war.
The company says that future weapons will be created based on AI.: "The question is not whether a weapon based on artificial intelligence will be created, but who will create it and for what purpose. Our opponents will not waste time on theatrical debates about the feasibility of developing technologies that are crucial for the military and national security," the document says.
Nuclear deterrence is becoming a thing of the past, Karp is convinced, and should be replaced by deterrence through AI models.
In other words, being one of the main suppliers of software products for the Pentagon, Palantir announces the transition to a "sixth generation war" — and, of course, its more active participation in this process.
According to Andrey Soyustov, states with the appropriate capabilities will pay special attention to improving methods of collecting and analyzing information. To date, they don't always work as they should.
— Of course, first of all, we are talking about the potential of artificial intelligence and the improvement of algorithms. And they're not perfect. The US's use of AI to identify potential targets and issue targeting orders as quickly as possible had side effects. For example, an automobile dump located on the territory of Iran was defined as an accumulation of military equipment, and artificial intelligence issued a proposal to strike at this facility," the expert said.
War No. 6
This means building a so—called network army to wage a "network-centric war."
In this scheme, artificial intelligence coordinates the actions of combat units, each of which, thanks to autonomous access to information, in a sense becomes "its own commander."
As Andrey Soyustov explains, the elements operating on the battlefield will be tied into a single network with the fastest possible information about their status, route, and location. And, accordingly, with the ability of the command to perceive the picture of what is happening on the battlefield as objectively as possible.
For example, with the help of artificial intelligence, a single UAV operator or a small unit will be able to control dozens of autonomous platforms simultaneously.
And of course, robotic technologies will be further developed. They are already being used even by the most advanced countries, military analyst Boris Jerelievsky emphasizes.
— We see that systems are being created that can operate autonomously on the battlefield. And it is obvious that the trends will expand more and more. There is already a certain exclusion zone in the area of the line of combat contact, in the zone of its own. Most likely, in the future, there will be, so to speak, a zone where exclusively robotic ground systems and UAVs with artificial intelligence will operate, which will autonomously search for targets, find and destroy them independently. Such developments already exist, including in Russia," the expert said.
In addition, according to Jerelievsky, AI is already being actively introduced into electronic warfare systems.
— Their task will be to hack into closed channels and, among other things, to influence systems working with elements of artificial intelligence. The work is going in this direction," the source told Izvestia.
The war literally goes into space: with the help of satellite groups, actions on Earth are coordinated, targets are intercepted, and early warning systems are in operation.
Analysts say the same thing about the war at sea, where ships become a concentration of the enormous power of precision weapons. According to Boris Jerelievsky, the current conflict in Iran has shown that the old—style fleet, with aircraft carrier groups and large ships, is not effective in modern conditions - with the use of modern missile systems, hypersonic systems and UAVs, it has become very vulnerable.
The goal of such a war is not to gain territories, but to destroy the power structure and critically damage the enemy's economy. That is, literally what they were trying to achieve in Washington and West Jerusalem.
Meanwhile, experts emphasize that the war of the future, among other things, expands the possibilities for regional powers, which, even without nuclear weapons, will be able to inflict unacceptable damage on larger and economically developed opponents, while maintaining their own stability. That's exactly what Iran is doing right now. And apparently, he's doing it successfully.
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