The cost structure of attack drones reflects deliberate design choices that prioritize affordability over sophistication. The Shahed-136, Iran's most successful export to the conflict, exemplifies this approach. Its airframe is simple stamped aluminum and composites, designed for single-use rather than durability. Its engine is derived from commercial applications, produced at scale for civilian markets before adaptation to military use. Its guidance system combines commercial GPS receivers with basic inertial backup—components available globally at commodity prices.
Iranian production costs for the Shahed-136 are estimated by Western intelligence at $20,000 to $30,000 per unit. Russian licensed production, still ramping up, likely runs somewhat higher due to supply chain inefficiencies—perhaps $40,000 to $50,000. Even at the upper bound, these figures represent a fraction of the cost of traditional precision weapons. A single Kalibr cruise missile, by comparison, costs Russia approximately $1.5 million. A Kh-101 air-launched cruise missile runs even higher.
The defender's cost equation is equally unfavorable. The missiles employed by Ukrainian air defenses were designed to destroy aircraft worth tens or hundreds of millions of dollars, not cheap drones worth a few thousand. When a NASAMS battery fires an AIM-120 AMRAAM at a Shahed, Ukraine expends a missile that costs approximately $400,000 to destroy a target worth perhaps one-fifteenth that amount. The Patriot system's PAC-3 interceptors, optimized for ballistic missile defense, cost over $4 million each—a hundred times the cost of the drones they might engage.
This cost asymmetry operates in Russia's favor even when its attacks fail. If Ukraine intercepts 90 percent of a 100-drone attack—an excellent defensive performance—the defender has expended perhaps $30 to $40 million in missiles to destroy $3 million worth of drones. The ten drones that penetrate defenses may cause damage exceeding their own cost, but that is almost beside the point. The real damage is to Ukrainian missile stockpiles, which deplete faster than they can be replenished.
The sustainability problem this creates has become acute. Western production of the air defense missiles Ukraine relies upon was scaled for peacetime requirements—training, occasional contingency operations, and gradual stockpile maintenance. The consumption rates of the Ukraine conflict exceed these baselines by orders of magnitude. Expanding production takes time: new manufacturing lines must be established, supply chains extended, workers trained. These processes operate on timelines of years, not months.
Ukrainian forces have responded by shifting interception burdens toward lower-cost systems wherever possible. The German Gepard self-propelled anti-aircraft gun has emerged as a critical asset for drone defense, engaging targets with 35mm cannon fire at a cost of perhaps $5,000 per engagement—one-eightieth the cost of a missile intercept. Soviet-legacy gun systems, including the ZSU-23-4 Shilka and towed ZU-23-2 mounts, have been pressed back into service for similar roles.
Electronic warfare offers another approach to cost-effective defense. Systems capable of disrupting GPS signals or jamming drone control links can potentially disable multiple drones at minimal per-engagement cost. Ukrainian forces have deployed both Soviet-legacy and Western-supplied electronic warfare systems, with varying effectiveness. The limitation is that drone guidance systems can be hardened against jamming, and the Shahed's inertial backup navigation provides a degree of resilience that simpler drones lack.
Looking forward, several technologies promise to reshape the economics of drone defense. High-energy laser systems, after decades of development challenges, are approaching operational viability. A laser weapon has effectively unlimited ammunition—its marginal cost per shot is the electricity required to power it, measured in single-digit dollars. The challenge is that current systems lack the power and tracking precision to engage targets at the ranges and volumes the drone threat requires.
Microwave weapons offer area-effect capabilities that could engage multiple drones simultaneously by disabling their electronics. Prototype systems have demonstrated effectiveness in controlled tests, but operational deployment remains years away. Counter-drone drones—small, inexpensive unmanned systems designed to physically intercept attacking drones—represent another avenue of development, potentially matching cheap attackers with equally cheap defenders.
Until these technologies mature, the economics of drone warfare will continue to favor the attacker. The implications extend beyond Ukraine to any future conflict where similar dynamics might apply. The proliferation of drone technology ensures that the capability to produce cheap precision weapons will spread; the mismatch between drone costs and traditional air defense costs will become a general challenge rather than a Ukraine-specific one.
Military planners across NATO have drawn conclusions from this economic analysis. Investment in short-range air defense systems—previously a lower priority than high-end missile defense—has surged. Development programs for directed energy weapons have received accelerated funding. Concepts for "distributed defense," replacing concentrated battery positions with dispersed, networked engagement nodes, have gained traction in doctrinal discussions.
For Ukraine, these long-term solutions offer limited immediate comfort. The economics of the current fight remain unfavorable, and the gap between drone production and interceptor supply may widen before it narrows. Each night's defensive success buys time, but time is itself a resource that must be paid for. The cost, measured in missiles and money and human endurance, continues to accumulate.