US, Israel race to destroy Iran’s missiles, cheap drones before they’re out of ammo

(Originally published March 5 in “What in the World“) Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said Trump’s campaign in Iran was “accelerating, not decelerating.”

Though the U.S. and Israel are racking up devastating damage to Iran compared with the destruction Iran has achieved in retaliation, analysts looking at the expenditure of munitions note that the war is costing the U.S. and its allies considerably more than it is costing Iran. Why? U.S. missiles cost as much as 60 to 70 times the cost every cheap Iranian drone they shoot down. A Shahed 136 drone with a range of 1,900 kilometers costs less than $50,000, while one of the PAC-3 interceptors made at Lockheed Martin’s Arkansas plant costs at least $3 million.

And the waves of cheap Iranian drones—more than 2,000 in just five days—are forcing the U.S. and its allies to rapidly deplete those expensive interceptor missiles. The White House has boasted it has plenty of missiles left. But unnamed officials have told reporters that the U.S. may be just days away from having to start conserving interceptors, ostensibly allowing some Iranian attacks to hit some targets so there are enough interceptors left to protect more important ones.

Worse, China and Russia are keeping tabs and, if stockpiles sink low enough, could seize the opportunity to mount their own offensives, like, say, invading Taiwan. U.S. and Israeli attacks on Iran’s missile launchers and weapons depots are, however, starting to dent Iran’s rate of retaliation. Iran may thus run out of weapons before the U.S. and its allies run out of interceptors.

But now that he’s started it, Trump can’t seem to stop his war in Iran from spreading. On Wednesday, a U.S. destroyer shot down an Iranian missile aimed at a military base in Turkey that hosts U.S. forces. The prospect of Iran attacking a member of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, of which Turkey raised the prospect of triggering the treat’s Article 5 obligation for members to defend any member that is attacked. After an Iranian drone struck a British base in Cyprus, Greece, France, and the U.K. said they were moving warships to the region. France has also asked the Netherlands to use its navy to help secure global shipping.