Wladimir van Wilgenburg filmed incoming drones over Erbil in the Kurdistan region of Iraq and watched U.S. defenses blast them from the sky. The explosions shook nearby apartment blocks. Van Wilgenburg said the drones — sent by Iran to strike U.S. facilities — have become a daily risk, and interceptions are common. “Most of these drones … don’t reach their destination,” he said.
But those interceptions are expensive. A typical Iranian Shahed-136 costs Tehran roughly $20,000 to $50,000, while U.S. interceptors such as Patriot and THAAD cost millions apiece. That mismatch lets Iran drive up the cost of fighting, says Kelly Grieco, a senior fellow at the Stimson Center. U.S. officials have warned privately they may run low on interceptors and might need to draw from stockpiles outside the region.
The drone attacks have been relentless during Operation Epic Fury. Early strikes killed six U.S. service members when a drone hit a U.S. operations center in Kuwait. Petroleum facilities in the UAE have been targeted. Two Iranian drones struck the U.S. embassy in Riyadh, and the U.S. embassy in Iraq was also hit. In response, the Pentagon has used high-end missile defenses across the region and said drone launches have fallen dramatically; Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said attacks were down about 95% since the fighting began. Experts caution that a drop in launches does not mean the drone threat is eliminated — it could reflect degraded Iranian capacity, tactical shifts, or temporary pauses.
Drones have reshaped modern conflict worldwide. High-end systems like the U.S. RQ-4 Global Hawk cost roughly $130 million and provide long-range surveillance. At the other extreme, cheap quadcopters and hobbyist drones have been repurposed as attacking munitions. The Shahed family — expendable, propeller-driven UAVs tied to Iran — has been used to strike bases and shipping and has been reverse-engineered by others. Russia bought Shahed designs and produced its own Geran variants; the U.S. has developed a Shahed-like low-cost attack drone called LUCAS.
No conflict has advanced drone warfare faster than Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Facing a stronger foe, Ukrainian forces adapted off-the-shelf first-person-view (FPV) drones to attack tanks and vehicles, and later used inexpensive methods to intercept incoming Shaheds, including machine guns, jamming, and inexpensive counter-drones. Ukraine claims about a 90% kill rate against some Shahed-type attacks and has offered to share techniques with the U.S., but President Trump dismissed Kyiv’s offer of its “Sting” interceptors, saying the U.S. did not need help.
Ukraine’s experience also shows limits: while drones enable asymmetric strikes and have inflicted damage, they have contributed to a grinding, attritional stalemate rather than decisive victory. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has said Russia launched more than 57,000 Shahed and similar drones at Ukrainian cities over four years; Ukraine has fired thousands back.
In recent weeks, Gulf states have faced waves of cheap Iranian drones that U.S. systems are intercepting. The UAE reported engagement of 304 ballistic missiles, 15 cruise missiles and 1,627 UAVs since hostilities escalated. Missile-defense systems and aircraft help at high altitudes, but Shaheds fly low and can appear late on radar, making them hard to spot. “They’re not necessarily that hard to kill once you see them,” says Thomas Karako of the Center for Strategic and International Studies, “but they’re hard to see.”
Experts say the U.S. had warnings. Planners watched Ukraine’s drone innovations and held conferences on low-cost threats, yet U.S. bases in the Gulf appear to have lacked multi-layered, low-cost point defenses that could stop small, low-flying UAVs close to valuable sites. Dara Massicot of the Carnegie Endowment says the U.S. is now scrambling to field layered defenses in real time — combining interceptors and aircraft with simpler, ground-based point defenses like .50-caliber guns or short-range systems to catch “leakers” that get past long-range interceptors.
The economics of the fight are stark: Iran can afford to expend many cheap drones and impose high costs on adversaries that must use expensive interceptors. That has prompted concern Washington could run short of interceptors before Iran exhausts its drone stocks.
Drones have proliferated beyond states to nonstate actors and fragmented conflicts. They played roles in the recapture of Mosul and in Sudan’s civil war, where Iranian-made drones have been used against rebels and civilians, raising casualties and damaging infrastructure. In Gaza, Israeli forces have used drones extensively for surveillance and strike missions; Palestinians call the constant overhead noise “zanana.”
The spread of drone use signals a new chapter in air power and air defense. Cheap, expendable systems put aerial attack and surveillance within reach of smaller militaries and insurgent groups, enabling them to contest adversaries with larger air forces. The result is a changing battlefield in which layered defenses, rapid adaptation, and low-cost countermeasures are increasingly critical.
Experts offer lessons: prioritize multi-layered defenses that include simple point defenses to stop low-altitude threats; stock and manage interceptors with the economics of swarms in mind; and incorporate lessons from Ukraine and other conflicts into doctrine and procurement before crises force ad hoc responses. As James Patton Rogers of Cornell’s Brooks Tech Policy Institute notes, “there’s a kind of ‘bunkerization’ taking hold” as civilians shelter from drone attacks — a reminder that cheap aerial weapons reshape not only military strategy but everyday life in contested regions.
