The war between Russia and Ukraine is the first real-world conflict between nations using drones extensively.

As part of a war that began with Russian tanks crossing Ukraine’s borders, World War I-style trenches dug into the ground, and Soviet-manufactured artillery pounding the terrain, soldiers now observe the battlefield on a small satellite-linked monitor while their palm-sized drones hover just out of sight.

The fight set off by an 18th-century emperor-style land grab in Ukraine has turned into a digital-age struggle for technological aerial supremacy, with hundreds of reconnaissance and attack drones flying overhead each day — a turning point in military history.

Every phase of combat between Russia and Ukraine is integrated with drone fleets, aerial defenses, and jamming systems, which separate them by miles. Drones are utilized in this war to connect the physical distance between the adversaries, which are frequently separated by miles.

Historically, drones have been used by one side over largely uncontested airspace to locate and hit targets, such as those hit in U.S. operations in Afghanistan and the Middle East.

Ukrainian forces have used drones to strike targets outside the battle zone—in Russia’s Belgorod border region or in Crimea, which Russia illegally annexed in 2014, according to anonymous Ukrainian officials who spoke about sensitive issues. In addition, Russia has frequently bombed Ukraine’s critical civilian infrastructure with self-detonating drones, a low-cost alternative to high-precision missiles.

A Ukrainian reconnaissance drone flew through a gap between two jamming systems on the Russian border days before the September offensive to expel Russian forces from the northeastern Kharkiv region. It entered Russia and headed north across the Belgorod region, where Russia bases equipment to support its war in eastern Ukraine.

According to overhead images captured by the Ukrainians and later reviewed by The Washington Post, a base for Moscow’s own unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) was spotted.