Inexpensive, mass-produced drones have radically transformed the nature of modern warfare, giving less powerful states and armed groups the ability to challenge large armies and exhaust them in ways that were not previously possible.
According to a report published by Axios by writers Zachary Basso and Colin Demarest, these drones have changed the balance of power on the battlefields. Without it, Russia’s numerical and fire superiority might have eliminated Ukraine, the Houthis in Yemen would not have been able to disrupt international shipping traffic, and Iran, isolated and subject to sanctions, would not have been able to inflict this amount of damage on the United States and its allies.
The report indicates that cheap drones have upset the balance of traditional military superiority, as any state or armed group that has funding and some commercially available components can inflict gradual and costly losses on major powers.
At the heart of this transformation is the Iranian “Shahed” drone, whose price ranges between only 20,000 and 50,000 dollars, but which sometimes forces the United States and its allies to use interception missiles that cost millions of dollars each.
During the first week of the war alone, Iran launched about 2,000 drones toward American bases and allied targets in 12 countries, targeting airports, luxury hotels, and oil facilities in the Gulf.
On March 1, six American soldiers were killed when an Iranian drone was able to penetrate air defenses and strike an operations center in Kuwait. The report quoted a CBS News source as saying: “We did not actually have the ability to confront the drones.”
These aircraft proved their effectiveness before the war with Iran. Russia imported thousands of “Shahed” drones and used them in the war against Ukraine. It also established a factory to produce a local version of it, which turned into a daily weapon targeting Ukrainian cities.
The Houthis in Yemen also used a similar version to carry out attacks that disrupted shipping traffic in the Red Sea for a long period.
On the other hand, the United States also developed its own version after studying these drones. Commander of US Central Command, Admiral Brad Cooper, said that the US military “seized the plane, dismantled it, transported it to the United States, then redeveloped it and reused it against the Iranians.”
In light of the escalation of this threat, Ukraine has become a global reference in techniques for confronting drones after four years of war with Russia.
The report revealed that Kiev offered Washington to provide it with anti-drone technologies eight months before the outbreak of war with Iran, but the Trump administration initially rejected the offer before changing its position later.
After the outbreak of war, the United States sent ten thousand interception drones to the Middle East, each of which costs about 14 thousand dollars, less than the cost of the plane that was designed to intercept them.
According to the US Department of Defense, Iranian drone attacks have decreased by 95 percent compared to their peak.
But experts warn that this technology is only the beginning of a new phase of warfare, as combat systems that rely on sea and air drones and ground robots have begun to appear, all of which work in coordination based on artificial intelligence.
Oleg Roginsky, CEO of a company specializing in defense technology, says that the world is entering something like “phase zero of the Terminator scenario,” where autonomous systems begin to outperform humans on battlefields.
