They are slow, noisy and relatively easy to shoot from the sky. On New Year’s weekend, the Ukrainian military said they shot down one by one of the 80 exploding drones Russia sent its way.
“Such results have never been achieved before,” a spokesman for the Ukrainian Air Force said on Tuesday.
But behind that result is a question: How long can Ukraine sustain its efforts when many of its defenses cost so much more than drones?
According to experts, the Shahed-136 drones used by Russia and supplied by Iran are relatively cheap, while the weapons used to shoot them are much more expensive.
Artem Starosiek, head of Molfar, a Ukrainian consulting firm that supports the country’s war effort, estimates that it costs seven times more to use a missile to shoot down a drone than it does to use a missile to shoot down a drone. cost to launch one. Iranian drones can cost as little as $20,000 to produce, while the cost of firing one of the surface-to-air missiles used by Ukraine can range from $140,000 for a Soviet-era S-300. Bucket up to $500,000 for US-made NASAM. or National Advanced Surface-to-Air Missile System.
Some analysts say it’s an imbalance over time that could benefit Russia, costing Ukraine and its allies dearly.
Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky said in a recent overnight speech that Russia is betting on “the exhaustion of our people, our air defenses and our energy sector.”
Molfar said it estimates that, since September, Russia has fired about 600 drones into Ukraine. The operation, which took place at a pace as soon as Moscow suffered a series of casualties on the battlefield, caused blackouts and intermittent power outages just as the country’s harsh winters began to hit, exacerbating add to the misery caused by the full-blown invasion of Russia.
Both sides have used drones for more than just reconnaissance and attack since the Russian invasion began in February, the first time they have been widely deployed in a war in Europe.
Military authorities in Kiev have said little about the details of their air defense systems in keeping with operational secrecy that has largely covered up their war planning, or about costs, making it difficult to analysis becomes difficult.
Ukrainian forces used anti-aircraft guns and small arms fire to bring down some of the drones, but increasingly, as the Russians carried out night-time raids, Kiev also depended heavily on missiles fired from fighter planes and the ground. Officials said Ukraine used a surface-to-air missile called NASAM several times over the weekend against drones.
Michael Kofman, an expert on the Russian military at the CNA research institute, said that the Ukrainians are using “a zoo of different air defense systems” to counter the threat, including anti-missile systems. Soviet Union and NATO, each with its own cost profile.
Some Ukrainian anti-aircraft guns, such as the Gepard 2 radar-guided mobile gun system, are inexpensive compared to other Soviet and European-era defense systems being deployed. And some American-made interceptors are relatively expensive.
Even so, Mr. Starosiek said, the cost of shooting down a drone with a missile needs to be considered in the context. He notes that shooting down a drone costs much less than repairing a damaged or destroyed power plant. And then there’s the human element.
“Everybody is still alive,” he said.
In a report released on November 7, Molfar said that 82% of drones were shot down, but that number has increased since then.
He said Ukraine now depends on its allies, chief among them the United States, to resupply their air defense systems and pay their bills. There is a danger that those allies will grow weary of the cost over time.
“The cost is negligible as long as the West continues to provide military support to Ukraine,” Boulegue said.
