alt Hacker NewsIt's fascinating to me that Iran was able to develop this nascent drone industry on their own, while under a very aggressive sanctions/embargo system. It reminds me a bit of Soviet Union and how they were able to come up with, essentially, parallel industry with different flavors. How were they able to do this? Presumably PRC and Russia were supporting this industry either directly or indirectly with material and supply chain assistance, perhaps engineering expertise though I don't think Iran was in short supply of this. Interesting nonetheless, beyond the cost implications of defeating these cheap systems with very expensive missiles.
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The drones are simple, and, they're dependent on China for components.
Shaheds are probably the simplest thing in anyone's inventory.
They win by 'scale', not be capability.
Nobody has enough AA to cover everything, and, for what they can defend, they have 3 weeks of munitions.
There is some 'laser tech' coming along that will maybe change this dynamic. And some 'fast drone killing drones'.
Also, industrial espionage
https://www.cbsnews.com/boston/news/massachusetts-iran-drone...
> Presumably PRC and Russia were supporting this industry either directly
Not during development/early phases, they were created during time where sanctions were somewhat enforced. Debris analysis of earlier models show they were full of western COTs parts, including stripped components, i.e. think RU breaking washing machine for chips. Incidentally they were also fairly expensive, 4 digits, for otherwise a rudimentary - though elegantly simple form factor. At least given sanction constraints and relative to what Iran industrial base can muster at relative scale.
Realistically the BOM for one of these things should be low $1000s if value engineered by competent industrial power like PRC. Who has contract to acquire 1m loitering munitions/drones this/next year. There's have factories that can churn millions of of engines per year, i.e. 10s of 10000s of 1500-2500km fires per day.