Benjamin Jensen and Yasir Atalan
The IssueRussia’s drone campaign utilizes inexpensive Shahed drones to saturate Ukrainian air defenses and erode civilian morale through persistent nightly attacks. Originally Iranian made, these drones are now mass produced in Russia using Western electronics and essential Chinese components.
Ukraine urgently requires layered, cost-effective air defenses, including high-energy laser systems, to counter drone saturation. Targeted long-range strikes on drone production and launch sites and disrupting China’s supply of critical electronics to Russia are essential steps.
Russia’s relentless use of low-cost drones signals a broader shift toward attrition warfare based on overwhelming air defense systems with sheer numbers. Western governments must innovate in economical defenses and tackle Chinese technology flows fueling Russian drone production.
Russia is using a punishment strategy to force Kyiv into negotiations designed to end the war and hamper Ukrainian sovereignty for the next generation. This approach increasingly relies on a single weapon: the Shahed drone. Originally imported from Iran but now mass produced in Russia using a mix of smuggled Western electronics and important Chinese parts, these low-cost attack drones cause millions of Ukrainians to wake up to the sound of air raid sirens every night. This terror campaign has lasted longer than the infamous Blitz aerial bombing of London during World War II and shows no signs of letting up.
The intensive use of these low-cost drones highlights the need to help Ukraine discover additional low-cost countermeasures that limit the ability of Russia’s punishment campaign. Specifically, European states and U.S. firms should work together to test new approaches to air defense that build on Ukrainian wartime innovations (e.g., acoustic sensors, an integrated air defense network, and improvised surface-to-air missiles) and emerging approaches that use electronic warfare and even high-energy lasers. Second, the U.S. military should catalogue these efforts and use them to accelerate its own thinking about layered air defense in future conflicts, which will almost certainly see a mix of cruise missiles and ballistic missiles attacking alongside waves of one-way attack drones. In these fights, point airfield defense and mobile counter–unmanned aircraft systems will not be enough to counter drone saturation designed to break air defense systems and open attack lanes for more exquisite weapons.
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