In the opening hours of the U.S.-Iran conflict this March, a swarm of Iranian drones, each costing between $20,000 and $50,000, destroyed billions of dollars worth of American radar installations across the Middle East in a single afternoon.
Replacing that hardware will take years.
The U.S. fired Patriot interceptors at incoming Shahed-136 drones. Each Patriot missile costs between $2 million and $4 million. The Shahed-136 drones that were shot down cost roughly $30,000 apiece to produce.
Russia, which derives its Geran drone from the Shahed design, produces over 400 units per day. Iran’s own capacity exceeds 10,000 per month.
The arithmetic is remarkable. A single Shahed costs the attacker roughly one percent of what it takes to shoot one down.<