1. Neither side has been unable to stop the other from mass producing drones. Too easy to build in small facilities, whack-a-mole scenario.
2. Interceptors will become depleted, more "squeakers" will get through as time goes on.
Some graphs: https://bsky.app/search?q=ukraine+drone+graph
The latter, as they're built by Russia currently, require a decent size facility to build en mass. It's not the kind of thing Hamas could build in their tunnel system, for example.
I agree with your second point that interceptors will become depleted though and this is a serious problem.
The IRGC is significantly more resourced than Hamas, building enough to fire off 100s a week should be no issue for them. They can build ballistic missiles, they twice struck an oil refinery in Bahrain today: https://bsky.app/profile/elhamfakhro.bsky.social/post/3mgd5o...
Given the resources we are using today, while still seeing drones and ballistics get through, does not bode well for a 100% reliable system.
Do you have any specific links?
https://bsky.app/profile/cordhenning.bsky.social/post/3melao...
https://bsky.app/profile/emmanuellechaze.com/post/3lq5duclgi...
Ukraine gets money while scaling their manufacturing and everyone else gets drones that actually work and are continually being refined in the field.
Ukraine is well positioned to be a major arms supplier for the new drone warfare reality. No one has the experience they do.
https://www.osw.waw.pl/en/publikacje/analyses/2025-12-19/us-...
Congress has merely secured the financial pool; the decision on whether and how the money will be spent ultimately lies with the Secretary of War (Defense).
This article has a representative image: https://www.yahoo.com/news/articles/us-qatar-discuss-acquiri...
You can find videos of their use too
He perfectly understands that whatever Ukrainian military technology is sold to US, Israel, Gulf States will be shared with russia moments later.
Russia and Ukraine both ultimately scaled up volunteer started development and production of that "fastest drone on Youtube" for the interceptor role. Cheap, simple, and works against pretty much any prop-driven drone used there.
https://www.reddit.com/r/CombatFootage/comments/1rigqam/oper...
Russia did start to use those hobby jet engines instead of props on the attack drones, and that made them go 600km/h instead of 200km/h. I'm yet to see the interceptor drone for that - it will also have to use, while smaller, such a hobby jet engine. Again laughably cheap - $3K Alibaba. (there are some other options too, i think we'll see them in time too (if anybody have few mils to burn - ping me :). Anyway, the guys are having wonderful time as their hobby became the eye of the global multibillion hurricane of hot military tech. Even the Blackwater guy - the one who was riding the money tsunami back in the Iraq time - got into it by just recently becoming some C-exec in a pre-IPO Ukranian drone developer)
Something like the Phalanx only not $50k/burst.
that is the key. It is much more easy from all the aspects - logistics, cost, agility, etc... - to patrol, discover and intercept from a higher flying drone.
>radar guided
FPV, in visual and IR, cost pennies and available in millions of units from Alibaba, while those military radars cost a lot and not many of them are available.
The radar guided AA is used and works where needed and there not much other options - like for cruise missiles, 850km/h. You can see videos - the window of opportunity is usually short as cruise missile is also relatively low flying.
A patient observer? Any random idiot of the street that cares to watch the news occasionally could've figured that out.
> If you are an American tax payer, I would understand it if you were banging your head on the table right now
Oh I am, and my representatives hear from me very, very often. Unfortunately, it falls on deaf ears. Seemingly no one around me cares, and our leaders certainly don't. I feel like I'm going insane and living in some kind of weird bizzaro world.
To the best of my knowledge, the explosives-laden lawn mowers flying over Ukraine are mostly destroyed by cannon fire from the ground, cannon / machine-gun fire from aircraft (including converted GA aircraft), and interceptor drones.
I expect the US armed forces to be testing oodles of various cheap drones by now. E.g. the US has used Shahed-lookalike drones while attacking Iran recently.
"I'm sorry, we must've had a bad connection there, for a second it almost sounded like you were asking me FOR HELP"
Ukraine wants more Patriot air defense missiles in exchange. A reasonable deal.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2026_Minab_school_airstrike
[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Al-Ahli_Arab_Hospital_explosio...
Good thread with nuance: https://bsky.app/profile/mikeblack114.bsky.social/post/3mgbd...
That's not exactly how oil supply works. There's plenty of stockpiles which take months to burn through and only some places depend on Iranian oil. China is their biggest buyer and it's around 13.4% of China's oil imports.
Their plan is to bomb Iran into the stone age so it can't produce any more drones or missile launchers. It's questionable whether they can succeed though.
and they just annouced it's likely going through September (which means until end of year)
and they are now dropping 2000 pound bombs on targets next to civilians
https://www.politico.com/news/2026/03/04/evacuation-middle-e...
> "U.S. Central Command, meanwhile, is asking the Pentagon to send more military intelligence officers to its headquarters in Tampa, Florida, to support operations against Iran for at least 100 days but likely through September, according to a notification obtained by POLITICO"
(billion dollars a day and that's before replacing all the weapons)
mitchbob•1h ago