Posted on 07/19/2025 10:03:23 PM PDT by MinorityRepublican
Ukraine’s Defense Procurement Agency has signed contracts for ‘tens of thousands’ of interceptor drones, according to director Arsen Zhumadilov speaking in an interview published on July 14th.
The U.S. decision to supply more Patriot air defence missile batteries to Ukraine is vital to protect against Russian missiles. But stopping the massive drone onslaught is a job for far more numerous interceptor drones.
The Numbers Game
The strength of the Iranian-designed Shahed drones lies in their vast numbers. The low-cost drones fly at around 120 mph, with similar performance to a WW1 aircraft, and are just as easy to shoot down. The problem is the sheer volume of them. In June Russia launched over 5,000 Shahed-type drones (this includes smaller Gerbera and Parodiya types). The highest number in one night was 728.
This is far too many for system like Patriot to handle. The U.S. total production capacity is only around 650 Patriot missiles per year. These missiles cost $3.3 million each – roughly 100 times as much as a Shahed.
Patriots are still needed to counter Russia’s ballistic and cruise missiles, of which 181 were launched last month . These pose a major threat in addition to the drones. But Shaheds require something that can be scaled up as rapidly as the Russians can make their attack drones.
Previously relied on mobile fire groups equipped with anti-aircraft machineguns, thermal imagers and tablet computers. These groups were linked them to a nationwide command-and-control and sensor system which tracks the slow-moving Shaheds. But the Shaheds have switched tactics, flying at 10,000 feet or more, above the ceiling of antiaircraft fire, and plunging down vertically when they reach the target. The rate of downing Shaheds dopped from 95% or more to 86% last month, so around three times as many were getting through.
(Excerpt) Read more at forbes.com ...
“Ukraine’s Defense Procurement Agency has signed contracts for ‘tens of thousands’ of interceptor drones”
Thank you, appreciate the info
The defense contractors are making money coming and going!
Soon, his spies in the pentagon--STILL allowed to work and have security clearances under this half-assed administration--will report to Putin and XI that we are weakened sufficiently to put up zero effective resistance. Then the real fun starts.
I never heard of “interceptor drones” before. How does that work? Do they have software and sensors that enables them to lock on to a target? That sounds pretty sophisticated - and expensive. Or does someone on the ground guide them to the target? Probably the latter.
1. ARTICLE
Inside the Ukraine tech factories building drones to destroy Russian crafts — and not break the bank
Caitlin Doornbos
New York Post
7-19-2024
KYIV, Ukraine — With the US and Ukraine discussing a “mega deal” for Washington to purchase battle-tested drones from eastern Europe in exchange for American heavy weaponry, The Post got an exclusive look Friday at two Ukrainian companies that are developing the technology to blast Russian crafts out of the sky.
“In Ukraine, there is a phrase people have been using — that ‘quantity’ becomes ‘quality,’” said Nomad Drones co-founder and CEO Andrii Fedorov.
A single, highly advanced interceptor missile or rocket — such as those in America’s Patriot air-defense systems, can cost between $100,000 and $250,000, according to Pentagon data.
While those are effective for countering enemy missiles and other advanced air capabilities, they are not financially feasible to defend against Iranian-made, Russian-launched Shahed drones — which Moscow has deployed in large quantities against Ukraine due in part to their cost of under $10,000.
Nomad Drones, and a second company that requested anonymity to avoid Russian targeting after having been struck multiple times, are in the business of making hundreds of thousands of small interceptor missiles and drones — that often are even less expensive than Shaheds.
“There is absolutely no sense to waste a $1 million weapon to shoot down a $50,000 Shahed,” Federov said. “But if you have 20 drones, then the capacity costs you, say, $40,000 to shoot it down.”
This affordability is especially critical in a war where Moscow sent more than 700 drones through the skies in a single night just last week.
“It’s all about cost-effectiveness,” one of the second company’s employees told The Post. “The world is unfortunately becoming a more dangerous place every day. We do understand that even though Western technologies are so cool and modern — they are expensive at the same time.
“Obviously, we don’t want anyone to fight and we want peace, but we live in the real world and there will be a need for relatively cheap yet effective solutions that potentially may be used by our Western allies and partners in their conflicts if they happen.”
The anonymous company is making approximately 3-foot-long missiles designed to stop enemy drones before they can reach their targets, which in the case of Russia’s invasion often include civilian homes — and civilians themselves.
“These can save so many lives,” the employee said.
Meanwhile, Nomad Drones and others in the field are producing tens of thousands of interceptor drones each month.
These aircraft, which cost between $3,000 and $7,000 depending on their size, carry explosives that can be detonated remotely upon approach to an enemy vehicle to destroy it before it reaches a target.
While the US has long had highly advanced and expensive precision drones developed for special forces to wipe out adversaries with pinpoint accuracy, the reality of modern warfare — with hundreds of drones being launched at the same time to overwhelm opponents — would make such reliance ruinously costly.
The “mega deal” discussed by the Trump administration and the Ukrainian government, which Kyiv President Volodymyr Zelensky revealed in an exclusive interview with The Post earlier this week, would provide not just drones, but technology to rapidly advance America’s unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) capabilities.
Such a deal could be transformative for the military and American national security, with officials and drone experts warning that US technology lags far behind Russia and China.
“The people of America need this technology, and you need to have it in your arsenal,” Zelensky said Wednesday.
“I think this is really a mega deal, a win-win, as they say.”
2. VIDEO
Ukraine is developing new technology to blast Russian drones out of the sky
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FqgyWpNdYkc
About 500 Patriot missiles can be manufactured in a year. About 12 complete Patriot systems, including the radar and processors, can be manufactured in a year.
Yes. Russia, with the either unthinking or willing aid of our interventionist RINOs, is doing the Reagan strategy against us, depleting our capacity through production (in this case of cheaper drones, missiles, etc.)
Dovetail with the convergence of the DNI referrals and we’re in for a “fun” 2025.
Not just that, but BRICS is going strong. They are buying up gold...and SILVER...and our Stable Genius STILL has not let anyone look inside Ft. Knox yet.
At the end of the day, the casino always wins.
“Patriots are still needed to counter Russia’s ballistic and cruise missiles”
As a matter of fact, nobody wastes a SAM on a Geran drone. Also you need two Patriots to have a chance to hit a Tomahawk-grade cruise missile of four per Kh-101 with countermeasures. And there’s no chance in hell for Patriot to hit a modern ballistic missile.
In June, Ukraine received Russia-launched 5,000 Shahed-type drones
(includes smaller Gerbera and Parodiya types). The highest number in one night was 728.
This is far too many to handle for systems like US Patriot
air defense missiles Trump promised to supply Ukraine.
The US total production capacity is only around 650 Patriot missiles per year. These
missiles cost $3.3 million tax dollars each – roughly 100 times as much as a Shahed.
“The only way to win is not to play!”
-War Games
“our Stable Genius STILL has not let anyone look inside Ft. Knox yet.”
The most plausible, and simplest explanation is the gold reserve are substantially less than reported. Soon we may know more. European nations, who have gold held in safekeeping by the US are currently considering repatriating their supplies. If most or all of the gold held by the Federal Reserve and US Treasury has been depleted, we will soon hear reports the US is resisting or refusing to send the European gold to its home countries.
The US weaponizing the Swift payments system to place sanctions on foreign countries, the current tariff war, attacks on the dollar as the reserve currency by the BRICS, and the massive and rapidly growing US government debt has raised concerns in foreign nations about the economic stability and trustworthiness of the United States. Add to that the fact the US is no longer the premier global industrial power thanks to the offshoring of its manufacturing base. It is a consumer debtor nation, surviving on continued borrowing, not a producer nation.
Were it to be discovered the US Treasury and Federal Reserve have been lying about the size of US gold holdings, there will be a flight from the dollar and from US debt resulting in loss of US dollar reserve status. The choice of the US government when reserve status is lost, will be massive cuts in spending, including entitlements and defense to bring the budget into balance, or printing worthless dollars because foreigners spurn US debt instruments. Under the first scenario the US economy falls into a deep multi-year economic depression with significant social unrest as people reliant on entitlement spending experience extreme poverty and hunger. If money printing is the chosen, the nation will experience hyperinflation, the savings of the middle class will be completely wiped out, and social unrest will becomes widespread as millions of retirees and formerly middle class workers become impoverished.
The United States has lived too long in debtor fantasy land. There are signs globally our day of reckoning is approaching soon and none of the choices available are good. Consider that DOGE found hundreds of billions of dollars of waste in federal agencies during only a few weeks of auditing. DOGE was then essentially shut down before tackling some of the biggest spending departments, such as defense, and its remaining activity has been successfully reigned in by the bureaucracy and politicians.
Despite DOGE demonstrating there are hundreds of billions of savings by just cutting waste, Congress was only able to come up with $9 billion in savings in the just passed spending reduction bill and the bill barely passed. If you were a foreign nation or lender, would you trust economically an indebted nation so politically divided that it can’t even eliminate waste and corruption from its bloated budget?
“The defense contractors are making money coming and going!”
Follow the money. I bet it all leads back to the WEF and the neocons.
It seems that that microwave array the Pentagon just developed would be perfect for this task. It can take out a swarm of drones at once
“I never heard of “interceptor drones” before. How does that work? Do they have software and sensors that enables them to lock on to a target? That sounds pretty sophisticated - and expensive. Or does someone on the ground guide them to the target? Probably the latter.”
We’ll see. If the Russians stop their onslaught of Shaheed Drones, then, maybe, for once, Forbes will get something right about the war. But, typically, even when the Neocons think they have a good idea, China won’t sell them enough piece-parts to produce anything in the required numbers.
Ukraine just has parts shipped to Poland, and then re-shipped to Ukraine.
Russia does the same to bypass trade restrictions.
They are no longer simply Iranian drones. The Russians have actually made so many improvements in their own production that Ukraine will fail to stop them. The latest version is jet powered and moves much faster than the prop driven version. Also, the payloads are more destructive.
Stick a fork in Zelinski - he is finished. Trump is staging a coup as you read this. Zelinski has illegally reformed the government without constitutional powers and is now a real dictator who has torn up his own constitution. Trump is trying to spare NATO the obvious death blow the comes with defeat at the hands of the Russians, who the West has mocked since WWII.
The Brian Trust of Obama-Binden/Trump/Biden-Blinken brought us the SMO and Russia is fighting the war on a economic and wartime footing which is isolating the West by its own sacntions.
Bkmk
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