Advanced hypersonic weapons require expensive, delicate engineering and skilled staff, limiting rapid mass production. Additional manoeuvres, data links and other cruise-missile functions increase costs too. Drones offer cheaper attacks and compensate for shorter range with volume. Surface drones are judged to have achieved more success against ships so far than aerial drones. Their operating concept invites comparison with uncrewed spar-torpedo boats.
Notable Point · 3:35:14-3:36:55
Drone volume and the cost of advanced missiles
The industrial demands of advanced missiles explain why cheaper drones create a different saturation problem.