I think you miss the real power of Gandhi's method (as do most people who want to reduce it to pacifism). The point is very simply, to live life as both a protest against what the world is, and as an example of what it can be. Be heroic. Be strong. Let nobody break you.

I don't think that Gandhi's writings espouse a general abhorrence of violence or even sabotage. They represent however a willingness to stand above such methods, and to be heroic in every little thing. The salt protest is perhaps a great example. The message is "I don't need to sabotage you because you cannot break me."

The distinction between violence and non-violence is a remarkably difficult one to make. Punching someone in the gut is undeniably violent, but what about deeply insulting a person's character? Why do we draw a line between those? Why is it that razing a bridge is violent but sitting down in the revolving door of a business establishment preventing customers from entering not? So-called non-violent resistance tends to eschew deliberate and overt outward and tangible violence for a more subtle but even more important battleground, that of morale based on legitimacy and the moral high ground.

> I reference this merely to make the point that the reach of Gandhi's tactics do have a limit.

But here's the real dirty secret. It doesn't matter who is in power, the average everyday decisions are made by individuals, and foreign powers rely very heavily on local support. I won't second guess the French resistance (and I don't think Gandhi would have either), but I think it is dangerous to opine what would have happened given that Germany was not really in a position to dedicate a lot of force to France (given that their military was somewhat occupied elsewhere). Both Ghandi and the French Resistance existed in cases where foreign powers were dominating, in a mixture of positive and negative ways, but where the foreign power could not reasonably dedicate significant military forces to reconquer the area. WWII effectively destroyed Great Britain as a world superpower largely due to the toll the Battle of the Atlantic had on their navy. Germans may have been ruthless (look up the night and fog decrees), and they were very careful not to allow visible resistance show up, but that itself can make it a more effective protest. They can't throw all of France in the death camps can they?

Now, things like drones are problems because they are force multipliers. If one person can control several drones at once, it means less people need to be making the decisions but I am not sure what that will mean yet.