Drones Are Key to Winning Wars Now. The U.S. Makes Hardly Any
102 comments
·July 13, 2025tomComb
amelius
Also, if we keep buying Chinese EVs then in a possible war with China all they will have to do is turn on some power-mosfets in the battery circuit and they turn entire cities into smoke.
chgs
You think that wouldn’t escalate to nuclear exchange in days?
Incipient
Probably not. Nuclear deterrent is just that, a deterrent. Once it's used, it's done. I don't think either side would use it on a "that's not fair" play - they'd really be reserved to respond/prevent/equalise some event/situation that would cause them to lose a war.
rightbyte
Don't ruin the dreams of the militaria romantics.
dkga
One aspect of drone wars that I have been observing also is the importance of naval drones. For example, Ukraine successfully used it to scare away the bulk of the Black Sea Fleet; now drug lords in Colombia are already using them to send drugs to Europe.[0]
A plausible next step would be, if not already done, to have a fleet of small but powerful naval drones that act as sea buoys to sweep the sea for submarines - this would have the potential to complete change submarine deployment strategy.
Especially for countries with massive borders, including maritime borders, a fleet of aerial and naval drones will seem indispensable if nothing else for deterrence.
[0]: https://www.cbsnews.com/news/drone-narco-sub-seized-first-ti...
bn-l
If they’re that deep then they need to be autonomous because I don’t think there’s any way to reliably get a signal sub marine.
exDM69
Long distance communication with submarines is difficult but not impossible, there are four extra low frequency transmitters in the world to send signals in nuclear doomsday scenarios.
For shorter distances, there are acoustic and optical devices, and near surface some low frequency radios can be used.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Communication_with_submarine...
mikestew
“Communication” does not mean “can be used for command of a remote device”. The bandwidth is so low as to make it impractical (bytes per second or minute (in the case of ELF)), in addition to being one-way comm. You’re not remotely driving a boat with that.
pydry
Ukraine has tried multiple times to blow up the Kerch bridge with underwater drones and have now largely given up.
Underwater drones are not anywhere near as relevant in this war as airborne drones.
DennisP
It's not just about the bridge, and the drones aren't necessarily underwater. Some are basically jet skis. Ukraine has used them to blow up several large Russian ships, and denied Russian access to much of the Black Sea.
pydry
Id take Ukrainian claims of disabling the black sea fleet with a large grain of salt, especially since theyre also claiming to be routinely shooting down black sea fleet fired kalibr missiles.
lukan
A network of underwater sensors are already a thing.
Otherwise sure, drones will be everywhere soon. And since radio can and will be jammed, they already can autonomous find and kill their targets. Or whatever the AI classifies as enemy. Autonomous killer drones in our life time, yeah.
ta20240528
Wide-band spread spectrum communications (CDMA) can't really be jammed.
Since the basis of this is in every smart-phone, its odd it isn't used in military UAVs.
esseph
It absolutely can be jammed, the same way other frequency hopping radios and systems can and do get jammed.
4gotunameagain
Of course they can be jammed, it's just harder and needs more power.
In the military cat and mouse game I don't think it will be an issue. Maybe that is why fibre was adopted instead.
null
weego
The US makes small volumes of incredibly expensive drones because it suits how their suppliers want to guarantee contracts for big budgets.
What this conflict has shown is you need constantly supplies of basically garage-band single use drones that can be carried en-mass on the battlefield, which is a big change in the model.
lesuorac
idk, using such long and dragged out conflicts as proof of drones superiority seems to me like going to a U8 soccer tournament and deciding that the best way to win a soccer game is have your entire team form a death ball.
Drones are a low cost, low intensity projectile. Similar to a missile. It has utility. But as we can see, you don't win a war with just projectiles otherwise these conflicts would've been long over.
sorcerer-mar
I think the point is that if one side hadn't adopted drones, they'd have already lost.
lukan
Well, since both sides are using drones heavily, why should one side have already won?
In any case, drones and artillery are responsible for most kills. But to hold the land you still need boots and tanks on the ground. But they can also be soon replaced by drones. Or rather, there will be more and more of them and fewer humans with the main job of controlling and directing them.
amelius
Wars are mostly about who has the largest manufacturing capability.
China will win this anytime.
Kinrany
Wars can be won on technological sophistication alone.
amelius
But does US really have more technological sophistication and will it make a difference?
Some of the smartest people I've encountered in academia were Chinese. One Chinese guy was so smart that it left my professor (and me) puzzled about the speed at which he could absorb complicated concepts. I also see Chinese people and institutions on many research papers these days. Imho, it is foolish to rely on Western military supremacy, as if that were a thing.
pydry
which wars were won where one side had the greater manufacturing capability and the other side achieved a decisive win with technological advantage?
I cant think of any.
philistine
largest military manufacturing capability. Things are more complicated than your ability to make golf carts, electric cars, plastic molds, etc.
rapsey
They supply both sides of the ukraine/russia conflict and massively arming themselves at the same time.
Some time in the near future the west is in for a very rude awakening.
ironyman
The Pentagon has recently recognized small drones as 'consumable commodities' like bullets and grenades so there is a role for them to play but U.S. military isn't about to pivot to a strategy of winning wars with swarms of cheap quadcopters. The core of American military power is firmly rooted in long-range kill chains, which is about finding a target to take out (often far in advance of the operation) and then precisely killing it from far away.
clvx
Unless autonomous drones happen, Russia has proved fiber drones are the way to go. Not saying jammers wouldn’t be needed, but Russia had a lot of success using fiber drones to retake Kursk.
topspin
> Unless autonomous drones happen
Autonomous drones are an inevitability. Enormous force multiplication is available with autonomy. We're talking about a few people, or perhaps one person, defeating battalions.
The truth is autonomous weapons have been in use for a long time now. Mark 60 CAPTOR anti-submarine mines (circa 1979) autonomously identified enemies and launched a torpedo to destroy submarines.
krona
The drones Ukraine used in operation Spiderweb reportedly had "terminal guidance" software for the last mile of their mission.
A drone video intercepted by the russians was released showing this in action: https://en.defence-ua.com/weapon_and_tech/how_ukrainian_fpv_...
clvx
Probably trained for a specific location and targets but if you see how fast people adapt in the war of drones, I feel drones would need constant updates which might not be possible in certain frontlines. A tank at the beginning of the Ukraine invasion doesn’t look not even close to what they look now with all the anti drone add ons.
esseph
*for some tasks and mission sets
bamboozled
Are you implying Ukraine left Kurst because of fiber optic drones? Because I can assure you, that's got nothing to do with it.
I can also assure you that Ukraine using fiber topic, semi and fully autonomous drones with great effectiveness against the invaders.
clvx
I’m not implying that but it was one of the first places where they used it extensively.
kranke155
Fiber optic is just an adaptation. The war has been full of them. The logical end step seems to be autonomy. There is nothing special about fiber optic, it’s just a way to avoid EW.
pydry
It had a lot to do with it. Kursk was a heavily forested area where the Ukrainians largely had small troop deployments hiding under tree cover where fiber optic drones would hunt them down.
There are thousands of videos of this in Kursk alone.
Ukraine are able to set up "shielded corridors" to protect critical supply roads from fiber optic drone attack behind the front lines in the donbass but in kursk they were exposed and defenseless.
timmg
I'm pretty intrigued by companies like Anduril. I don't know much about them. But the idea that we apply more "tech startup" business models to defense doesn't seem like a bad idea to me.
My sense is that the existing defense contractors are old, slow and expensive (and conditioned to take huge sums from the government for developing future tech.)
In fairness, I'm not at all knowledgable about the industry. Just my impression of things. But it is hard to not be happy to see new entrants to any important market.
9dev
What’s it with all the LOTR nerds founding Defense startups by the way?
threatofrain
It's just Peter Thiel's companies. All these companies have an agreement with the Tolkien estate.
glimshe
LOTR is fundamentally a war epic.
causal
Kinda missing the point though if you're finding strength in industry
anton-c
Tolkien having s tier names helps, they're just cool
quotemstr
The nerds are the ones bored with B2B SaaS.
dmix
Even if we ignore the more controversial debate around Aircraft Carriers vs masses of Chinese road mobile antiship missile systems, doubling down in 2025 on high end cruise missiles that cost $2-4M each is probably the first thing that will look like a dumb choice when we look back in a decade.
wkat4242
What wars are actually being won with them?
I see them mainly used (eg Ukraine war) to annoy the other party with many military insignificant attacks on civilians. Very sad but not something that actually wins wars.
WJW
In the Ukraine war big troop concentrations have become almost impossible because the thousands of spotter drones in the air at any moment will spot them almost immediately, and provide accurate targeting information to (rocket) artillery within seconds.
FPV drones with a hand grenade strapped to them will finish off any stragglers. Bigger version (with more explosives) also apparently quite effective against armored vehicles like IFVs and tanks, and can be used to deploy new minefields without having to risk soldiers out in the open.
So perhaps they are not (yet) key to winning a war, but they are certainly already key to not losing. There's a very good reason Ukraine is ramping up drone production to several million per year. Convert that to drones deployed per day and use your imagination to come up with uses for 30000 kamikaze drones per day.
delusional
> Bigger version (with more explosives) also apparently quite effective against armored vehicles like IFVs and tanks
At that point it seems like it's basically a very slow moving missile, except it's steerable by a human operator.
I was under the impression that the value of these weapons was mostly in their simple construction from readily available parts (cheap ammunition and grenades instead of expensive purpose made javelins). Doesn't that kind of go away if you start to "innovate" with them?
If Lockheed Martin starts selling the drones at $30k a pop, I don't understand why they'd be better than a missile.
magicalhippo
> If Lockheed Martin starts selling the drones at $30k a pop, I don't understand why they'd be better than a missile.
Well a Javelin costs[1] around $200k, so if the alternative is just $30k then that seems like a great deal just there.
But a drone offers different capabilities. In particular they can hunt to some degree and you can launch one without immediately giving up your position. That means it's much safer for the operators.
Against distant but more stationary targets, one can take more time to navigate them close to critical weak spots, so you potentially need much less explosives to get the job done. Just look at what Ukraine did against those bombers[2] in Russia. Less explosives means you can make a smaller drone which is less detectable, harder to counter and easier to carry.
[1]: https://www.cnbc.com/2022/04/29/how-this-us-made-176000-anti...
esseph
The low cost and extremely high effectiveness of a drone is very useful.
Also missiles are normally tens of thousands to millions of dollars each, depending on size, launch method, etc. ATACMs is around 1.5mil. A Patriot missile vehicle is around $4 million just for the launcher. A Griffin missile is $127,000.
Many of these drones in Ukraine are sub $1,000.
WJW
According to the internets, Ukraine is pumping out drones at about $300 to $500 at a rate of several tens of thousands per day. Of course a missile is faster and has bigger payload, but as a sibling comment mentioned, a javelin missile is about 500x more expensive than these cheap drones and can only hit target per missile. I can think of many scenario's where having a few hundred drones available to hunt down individual soldiers would be much more valuable that having a single javelin.
ExoticPearTree
> If Lockheed Martin starts selling the drones at $30k a pop, I don't understand why they'd be better than a missile.
Different mission profiles.
Don’t compare apples to oranges.
bamboozled
Why would innovation mean more expensive?
The fiber optic FPV drone was an innovation and it's extremely cheap to build?
I don't think it's only been about cost, it's been about devastating effectiveness, they just happen to be much much cheaper than basically anything they destroy.
Necessity is the mother of invention, Ukraine is developing these things and innovating for actual survival, we're not talking about engaging lockhead martin on a 20 billion dollar budget.
ramchip
> As the invasion enters a fourth summer, drones are currently thought to account for around 70 percent of all Russian and Ukrainian battlefield casualties.
https://www.atlanticcouncil.org/blogs/ukrainealert/ukraines-...
zihotki
Insignificant? Are destroyed strategic bombers insignificant? As well as huge amounts of armor vehicles so that now motocycles and other cheap vehicles are used instead. They pay significant role now, may be even more than artillery
Eddy_Viscosity2
Wearing down your opponent with consistent (relatively) inexpensive attacks does in fact win wars. Attrition works.
guiriduro
They can be used to concurrently overwhelm air defences to improve the odds for more expensive cruise missiles. Ukraine has used small drones to decent effect tactically to disable vehicles, and vice versa (less effectively)
danmaz74
You're probably mostly thinking about Shahads and similar alternatives to cruise missiles, but what's much more significant in Ukraine is the use of FPV drones on the front lines to attack armor, transports, artillery and individual trenches. They account for the biggest part of inflicted losses nowadays.
Marazan
The majority of casualties on both sides are currently caused by drones.
Yes, Russia is also using them to terrorise civilians but they clearly have huge battlefield implications and any military not immediately addressing this issue is going g to go into their next conflict at a massive disadvantage
bamboozled
The title is, "Drones are the key to wining wars", not "Drones have won wars".
Read the article.
more_corn
And certainly doesn’t make the components. The moment China cuts off electronics shipments to the US we’re going to see a drastic hiccup in the supply chain for high tech weapons. It’s probably a good strategy to tear the bandaid off ourselves and see what stops.
If not now, soon.
The US is making a big mistake giving up on the EV chain. In doing so it is ceding drones and robots, which are key to future wars and economies.
The countries that it is currently waging economic war against should instead be engaged in creating an alternative to the Chinese supply chain. For example, it is currently disassembling the automotive supply chain that included Canada and low-cost Mexico, but it should be doubling down on that.