Smothers visits Ukraine often and told Business Insider that this mindset drives their success. This as-told-to essay is based on a conversation with Troy Smothers, a US Marine veteran sergeant who now runs American Made Freedom, a nonprofit that assists Ukrainian troops with fiber-optic drones.

This project shows how to turn a Seeed Studio XIAO ESP32-S3 into a Wi-Fi-enabled SMS alert system using an ultrasonic distance sensor.