Three battlefields, three very different answers to the same question: how best to use uncrewed aerial systems (UASs)?
In Nagorno-Karabakh in 2020, Azerbaijan likely spent tens of millions of dollars on various sophisticated loitering systems, including the IAI Harop and SkyStriker, deploying them to dismantle Armenia’s armored forces and air defenses in weeks.
In the Red Sea, the Houthis spend a few thousand to the low tens of thousands of dollars apiece on Samad-3 and Wa’id drones. In 2024, it was reported that intercepting these attacks cost the US over a billion dollars. Today’s figure is presumably higher.
Over Ukraine, Russia is unleashing hundreds of Geran-2 drones in a single wave, a domestically produced Shahed variant that can be built for as little as $35,000 each.
These are three different conflicts, shaped by different strategic goals and different available resources. Each offers defense ministries a distinct scenario to plan for, and each asks the same underlying question: should procurement emphasize sophistication, or mass?
