"Tiny" as in commercial with endurance measured in minutes / km have little roll to fill theatre as large as IndoPac in terms of peer battle. This article talki

"Tiny" as in commercial with endurance measured in minutes / km have little roll to fill theatre as large as IndoPac in terms of peer battle. This article talking about numbers in the 1000s for entire program when UKR is losing like 10K commercial drones PER MONTH. When DoD say tiny, I'm guessing they mean fighter sized loyal wingman tier drones, with 1500km combat radius. Attritable platforms that cost 10s of millions where savings is mostly pilot over head. And operating those at scale involved is still very dependant on complex logistics vs delivering platters of DJI to grunts given 10 hours of training. Having enough shelters, hardened, distributed... base access, and basically entire support and logistics chain because you're still going to need a fuck load of mechanics to support order of magnitude more vehicles. Maybe cheaper per whatever unit of KPI they're measuring but still going to be remarkably expensive program. I don't think the idea is bad, but I think as solution for IndoPac (read China), this is a concept where PRC already and will continue to easily outscales US while having more flexible distributed basing options vs US access to partners in region. Really this is US following, and plugging gap while they figure out NGAD, B21, or other longer / stand off range delivery options AT SCALE over next decades as they net lose ability to bring fires into IndoPac/PRC near shore because it becomes increasingly unsurvivable for US carriers and air assets in region. Carriers because PRC ISR and missiles increasing/improving incredibly fast - much more than US can scale defense which is fundmentally limited by physical dimensions of ship hulls. Air because stealth workhorse F35 was designed for Europe, doesn't have range for IndoPac without vunerable tanking. Queue solution for distributed risks / soaking up missiles while maintaining capability. Only problem is PRC industrial bases can spam more missiles and more drones and better positioned to weather the attrition game.