Now that's what I call research!
If you're calling the ISW propaganda, shrug.
I think the point stands: if you're interested in the state of the art in drone tech, you're almost certainly paying attention to the Ukrainians and Latvians.
For a long while I only distrusted their political commentary, as it was so obviously shit, at just rolled my eyes when they pretended the Ukrainians didn't send troops on raids toward Belogorod, but otherwise trusted that they at least covered military movements accurately.
Lately I have however seen accusations that they are also uselessly slow at reporting Ukrainian withdrawals, so at this point I wouldn't trust their milblogger coverage to deliver more than selected defeatist posts.
All that said, I think your point that (some of) the state of the art in drone tech is being desperately pushed in Ukraine is a good one. Though I'd add the qualifier that they have very specific concerns and constraints on their drone use (the one-way trips being a prominent one).
Definitely not to the ISW, though. (Just lmao.)
Later edit: Just to make sure, I’m not calling bollocks on ISW for this particular statement of theirs (even though I find it highly debatable), but on the information generally coming out of ISW
First sentence of today's ISW briefing: "Select Russian military commentators continue to complain about superior Ukrainian drone and electronic warfare (EW) capabilities on the battlefield, continuing to highlight the rapid and constant tactical and technological innovation cycles that are shaping the battlespace in Ukraine."
https://www.understandingwar.org/backgrounder/russian-offens...