Another example of civilizational inadequacy in military procurement:
Russia is now using Iranian Shahed-136 micro-cruise-missiles. They cost $20,000 each. [Insert napkin math, referencing size of Russian and Ukrainian military budgets]. QED.
Hundreds to thousands & I dunno, plausibly marked-up prices. The point is that if Russian military procurement was sane they’d have developed their own version of this drone and produced lots and lots of it, years ago. If Iran can build it, lots of nations should be able to build it. And ditto for Ukrainian and NATO military procurement.
Drones produced in Russia, like Orlan-10, use imported engines (and many other components). This may be the real bottleneck, rather than nominal price.
Still a massive failure of military procurement / strategic planning. If they had valued drones appropriately in 2010 they could have built up a much bigger stockpile of better drones by now. If need be they could make indigenous versions, which might be a bit worse and more expensive, but would still do the job.
Another example of civilizational inadequacy in military procurement:
Russia is now using Iranian Shahed-136 micro-cruise-missiles. They cost $20,000 each. [Insert napkin math, referencing size of Russian and Ukrainian military budgets]. QED.
How many are they sending and what/who are they paying for them?
Hundreds to thousands & I dunno, plausibly marked-up prices. The point is that if Russian military procurement was sane they’d have developed their own version of this drone and produced lots and lots of it, years ago. If Iran can build it, lots of nations should be able to build it. And ditto for Ukrainian and NATO military procurement.
Drones produced in Russia, like Orlan-10, use imported engines (and many other components). This may be the real bottleneck, rather than nominal price.
Still a massive failure of military procurement / strategic planning. If they had valued drones appropriately in 2010 they could have built up a much bigger stockpile of better drones by now. If need be they could make indigenous versions, which might be a bit worse and more expensive, but would still do the job.