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The Iranian-made Shahed 131 and 136 one-way assault unmanned aerial programs (UAS), which Russia now domestically produces beneath license with the designation Geran 1 and a pair of, respectively, have been main protagonists of Moscow’s strike marketing campaign in opposition to Ukrainian vital infrastructure. Additionally they symbolize a menace throughout the skies of many nations within the Center East, from Saudi Arabia to the United Arab Emirates to Israel, over the previous few years.
A number of of them have been used within the September 2019 Iranian-orchestrated assault in opposition to Saudi Aramco’s oil terminals in Khurais and Abqaiq, which briefly knocked out 5% of the world’s oil provide. Shahed-136 drones are additionally among the many Houthis’ weapons of option to strike business vessels transiting within the Pink Sea and Hormuz Strait, wreaking havoc on international maritime commerce and connectivity.
Their effectiveness within the Ukrainian theater, nevertheless, appears on a declining trajectory. In latest months, Ukraine has been bettering its counter-drone and low-tier air protection capabilities by increasing its early-warning network of fastened distributed radar, electro-optical and acoustic sensors. The navy additionally has been coaching new “cellular hearth teams” specialised in looking Shahed and different one-way assault drones, the overwhelming majority of that are shot down.
Combination information collected by this creator and based mostly on official numbers launched by the Ukrainian Air Drive point out that the interception charge of Shahed UAS has steadily elevated prior to now 5 months, with a mean of 91% since March 2024.
By comparability, the common Shahed interception charge through the earlier 6 months was 80%, with the best determine of 83% recorded in November final 12 months. Ukraine’s rising success in opposition to the Shaheds stems from the mix of widespread multispectrum sensor protection and efficient techniques, strategies and procedures. As for {hardware}, Ukrainian forces have fielded a mixture of cellular counter-UAS and short-range air protection capabilities for mix digital warfare (EW), anti-aircraft weapons akin to ZU-23-2 and German-made Gepard, shoulder-fired air protection programs akin to Stinger and Igla, and cost-effective laser-guided rockets such because the U.S.-provided superior precision kill weapon system (APKWS).
These operations may also embrace using medium-range air defenses and tactical aviation, thus requiring clean coordination between ground-based hearth groups, brigade command posts and aviation headquarters to deconflict and keep away from friendly-fire incidents.
Total, the Shaheds’ reducing effectiveness is proportional to the advance of Ukraine’s C-UAS and short-range air protection (SHORAD) capabilities and demystifies the drone’s overhyped operational influence typically pushed throughout the mainstream debate. In truth, sufficiently dense, layered countermeasures – and the skilled personnel required – are completely able to coping with Shahed and different one-way assault UAS, to the frustration of “game-changer” theorists and drone-fetishist commentators.
Removed from being arcane or costly, these countermeasures ought to complement direct assaults in opposition to enemy drone groups and infrastructure and include cost-effective options akin to anti-aircraft weapons with airburst ammunition, MANPADS, and low-tier guided interceptors, like BAE Programs’ APKWS 70mm laser-guided rocket and Raytheon’s Coyote Block II+ missiles.
Defensive options to the menace posed by Shahed and different one-way assault drones are already on the market and ought to be scaled up by NATO allies with out hesitation. The one query is whether or not governments and planners throughout the alliance resolve to put money into scalable low-cost interceptors and short-range air protection capabilities amidst many different protection priorities.
Nonetheless, whereas Shaheds’ effectiveness is diminishing, it will be a mistake to underestimate the menace these and different one-way assault drones pose. As seen in Ukraine and elsewhere, these programs can be utilized to disclose the positions of air protection property, deplete air-defense interceptor shares, and siphon functionality assets that could possibly be used elsewhere, whereas even just a few programs (e.g., 2-3%) that handle to succeed in their goal can provoke critical destruction, particularly in opposition to vital infrastructure. As well as, the drones’ effectiveness dramatically will increase when used as a part of saturation assaults combining long-range missiles.
However this downside is hardly an unsolvable one and ought to be excessive on the protection agenda of NATO nations.
Federico Borsari is a resident fellow with the Transatlantic Protection and Safety Program on the Middle for European Coverage Evaluation (CEPA), the place he additionally leads the Protection Know-how Initiative.
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