I wonder if one of the reasons why Putin decided to move in now was in order to prevail before Ukraine was fully equipped with attack drones that could negate the overwhelming Russian superiority in conventional armored forces. The latest Armenian-Azeri conflict showed what new technologies could do against traditional weapons. Türkiye is certainly not too thrilled about a strong Russia controlling the whole north side of the Black Sea and I have seen in flightradar24 a number of Turkish A400 flying earlier to Kyiv and now to eastern Poland, probably delivering additional TB2 systems and weapons.
