US military needs ‘urgent revolutionary institutional change’ to prepare for modern war, Petraeus says

Defense News | Katie Livingstone

Unmanned systems now inflict more than 90% of Russia’s casualties on the front lines in Ukraine, yet no NATO military, including America’s, has begun the overhaul that kind of war demands, Ret. Army Gen. David Petraeus said on Oct. 16. His remarks came weeks after the Pentagon announced a new command for autonomous warfare.

Ukraine and Russia each use roughly 10,000 drones a day, he said. Tanks are no longer survivable there. Petraeus calls for a concept of warfare running through force structure, training, procurement, personnel policy and bases, with cheaper, more numerous unmanned systems replacing legacy manned equipment. He called the new Autonomous Warfare Command a commendable step. Acquisition, he said, requires manufacturing capacity able to change software weekly and hardware every few weeks. Zelenskyy said in July that Ukraine will produce as many as 20 million unmanned systems this year, though operator shortages and component supplies, including optics, gimbals, brushless motors and fibre-optic cable, constrain output.

Comment

Petraeus’s industrial argument has two halves that pull against each other. A drone line able to push software changes weekly and hardware changes every few weeks relies on cheap, replaceable output. Missile defence runs on the opposite logic: a Congressional Budget Office estimate puts Iran-war use at between one-half and two-thirds of certain U.S. interceptor stocks. Stocks drawn down that far would probably refill at the pace of specialised production lines rather than a software update cycle.

The Red Sea offers a second case. From late 2023, US Navy destroyers fired SM-2 interceptors during Operation Prosperity Guardian against drones and missiles launched by Houthi forces from Yemen. Cheap attackers drew expensive defensive missiles, so a drone-heavy adversary can drain magazine depth without reaching a target. Petraeus calls aid to Kyiv a policy decision, yet any interceptors sent to Ukraine would come from the stock the Iran war is drawing down.

Ukraine’s own bottleneck sharpens the point. Operator shortages and scarce optics, gimbals and brushless motors hold back its drone output despite the stated target of 20 million systems. Petraeus’s model of a factory able to change hardware every few weeks would depend on those same inputs as much as on manufacturing capacity.

Strategic Question for Discussion

Which constrains US support for Kyiv more, interceptor depth after the Iran war or the policy choice Petraeus describes, and what would tip the balance?

My assessment is that interceptor depth sets the limit and policy only decides the order of priority within it. The Red Sea experience of destroyers firing SM-2 missiles at Houthi drones suggests that heavy consumption narrows the choices open to decision-makers. Aid to Ukraine would then compete directly with the stocks the Iran war has already consumed.

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