Posted on 08/11/2025 10:05:05 AM PDT by whyilovetexas111
Drones don't cross oceans.
Tool and die components as well a large stamping mills are still the driving force.
You are certainly correct about quantity having a quality of its own, which something that Eisenhower explained to Rommel 80 years ago.
That said, the per-unit cost of the “Ghost” UAV isn’t publicly known, though the term “low hundreds of thousands of dollars” gets tossed around. It’s been used for at least three years in combat operations in Ukraine, and has been shown to be effective against Russian troops (and in some reports, armor) in both strike and recon missions.
The CCP is making and selling larger Reaper competitors in the 2-5MM range, and much smaller recon oriented short range products in the 10-60K range per unit, but the Ghost is sort of a unique niche. It’s cheap enough to be considered attritable if used against higher-value targets, but capable of a much wider range of missions than the smaller quad-copters.
China is a real threat, and not to be taken lightly, but these new, more nimble, and more innovative American defense companies shouldn’t be given short shrift, either. Just in So Cal, you’ve got in addition to Anduril, Epirus (around the corner from Space-X, and with a bunch of Space-X alums) working on counter-drone directed energy defense systems, CX2 in ‘Gundo, and let’s not forget the larger manufacturing ecosystem that’s developed, with firms like Hadrian making all of these other defense companies vastly more efficient.
This isn’t a time to be blackpilled, when you look at these newer “hard tech” startups, who are getting plenty of venture funding.
At the very least, it’s a race, and the CCP and Iran are not winning. At least at the moment.
You can't actually believe that, right?
I can prove it.
Net profit margins, which reflect the “bottom-line” profit after taxes and all expenses, generally range between 2.8% and 3.5% across the U.S. retail sector.
If retailers had a 1000% margin to play with, I fail to see where 996% of the markup went.
OK, lets never solve the problem.
I think everyone wants to solve the problem, but you need to properly define the cause first, and a 1000% retail markup isn’t the cause.
Missiles can only blow things up, they can’t hold land. Clinton threw missiles at the Taliban, what good did that do. We can throw missiles at the Houthies. What good is that. A million cheap drones with satellite control, cameras and bombs or guns, that will hold land. A few marines can take control. Missiles have their place but they can’t win a war.
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