Both militaries are expanding their use of drones, though in different ways that reflect their resource asymmetries
On June 1, Ukraine launched a large-scale and coordinated attack on Russia’s long-range bomber force thousands of kilometres from the frontline. Aerial drones are now central to both sides’ military operations. Ukraine has adopted a decentralised, adaptable ‘network’ approach to drone production. Russia’s is more organised, relying initially on Iranian technology, though it too has become increasingly innovative and has embraced cheaper models that seek to overwhelm Ukrainian air defences.
What’s next
Subsidiary Impacts
- The large-scale use of cheap drones will deplete stocks of more expensive, traditional air-defence munitions.
- Ukraine will be able to use drones to attack Russian targets even if allies reduce military support.
- Traditional combat aircraft will continue to be useful for delivering large payloads.
Analysis
The Ukrainian drone strike on multiple Russian air bases, known as Operation Spiderweb, inflicted a serious blow to Russia’s long-range strategic bomber fleet (see UKRAINE: Airbase attack could elicit severe response – June 2, 2025).
The attack took place after Russia increased the tempo of its drone strikes on Ukraine, with hundreds of drones targeting Ukraine each night since mid-May. Ukraine’s ability to strike as far as eastern Siberia marks a new level of operational sophistication.
Significant Russian losses
Initial independent assessments indicate the attack destroyed at least eight Tu-95 bombers and four Tu-22M bombers. In addition, at least one A-50M airborne early warning and control (AEW&C) aircraft appears to have been destroyed. Satellite analysis suggests the most significant losses were recorded at the Belaya airfield in Russia’s Far East and Olenya airbase in the Arctic.
If confirmed, this would mean that between 10-15% of Russia’s long-range bomber force was destroyed or damaged in the attack. Russia will not be able to replace the lost aircraft, as production ceased decades ago. However, the losses are unlikely to have much impact on the war in Ukraine. The availability of munitions — such as the Kh-101 air-launched cruise missile — has been a more significant constraint on Russia than the availability of launch aircraft.
Crucially, most Russian large-scale air attacks on Ukraine increasingly comprise large numbers of cheaper strike drones, such as the Geran, in conjunction with smaller numbers of cruise and ballistic missiles. Consequently, a reduction in the number of bombers is unlikely to disrupt Russia’s ability to attack Ukrainian targets.
Ukraine’s ‘startup’ ecosystem
Ukraine has been forced to adapt its wartime production to its more limited economic and industrial resources. Rather than concentrating production in a relatively small number of enterprises, as Russia does, Ukraine has mobilised private businesses and individual citizens to create an “Army of Drones.”
The Ukrainian drone industry is a network of startups, capitalising on a highly skilled IT workforce that had developed before the war. There are currently some 500 drone manufacturers, reportedly with a theoretical production capacity of 5 million units per year, according to Ukrainian government officials.
Ukrainian drones come in a wide range of shapes and sizes, including repurposed civilian drones — such as toy drones — for military use. The advantage of Ukraine’s decentralised model is a high degree of adaptability to technological change and the demands of the battlefield.
Ukraine has a more decentralised and innovative approach to drone development
Financing is also flexible, as it comes from a variety of state and private investors, including both institutional and individual investors. The “Army of Drones” project is financed in large part through a fund-raising platform set up by the Ukrainian World Congress (UWC), an international network of donors, and Ukrainian state bodies.
The attack on June 1 made use of small, low-tech quadcopters. Although not advanced technologies, they were deployed in an innovative and operationally sophisticated manner, with drones concealed in civilian transporters and deployed near their targets.
Russia pivots to cheaper drones
Russia had been conducting research into military drones since the 2000s, but it has increasingly relied on the Iranian-designed Shahed-136, manufactured in Russia as the Geran-2, since the war began in 2022 (see RUSSIA: The importance of aerial drones will rise – January 15, 2025).
The Geran strike drone has several advantages, including its long range, payload of around 30 kilograms in the original Iranian design and technological simplicity, which makes it cheap and easy to manufacture, especially since Russia started producing them domestically rather than importing them from Iran.
Whereas leaked documents published by an Iranian hacker group known as the Prana Network show that, in 2022, Iran quoted Russia unit prices of between USD193,000-290,000 per drone, current estimates of the manufacturing cost of the drones in Russia vary between USD20,000-50,000 per unit.
The Geran drones are manufactured at a plant in the Alabuga Special Economic Zone (SEZ) in Tatarstan, which also produces other types of drones, such as the Albatross reconnaissance drone and the Gerbera decoy drones (see RUSSIA: Local production of Iranian drones will grow – November 17, 2023).
The Geran is the workhorse of Russia’s drone fleet
The importance of this plant to Russia’s war effort is reflected in Ukrainian efforts to disable it: Ukrainian drones have targeted the facility at least twice (most recently on April 23, 2025), failing to cause significant damage. The facility is located far from Ukraine in relative isolation. It is equipped with significant air defences, including an anti-aircraft site situated on the most likely approach route from Ukraine.
Quantity over quality
As with a range of other statistical data, Russia does not publish defence industry production figures. However, a contract leaked by the Prana Network referred to Russian plans to reach a production of 6,000 Shahed-type drones per year from the Alabuga facility. Other unverified reports claim that the Alabuga plant produced 5,760 drones in the first nine months of 2024 and aimed to increase production to 10,000 per year from 2025.
Russia is also making constant improvements to the original Iranian design. The drones are being fitted with jet engines, which allow for higher payloads — up to 90 kilograms — and faster speeds, although this complicates production.
However, the added complexity must be seen in the context of the broader military strategy: the Geran drones are deployed in swarms that include decoys, with “dummy drones” accounting for around half of the drones that Ukrainian radars detect.
These cheaper drones offset the cost of improvements to the real armed drones and help to confuse Ukraine’s defence systems. Swarm attacks also offset the fact that the Geran drones are relatively inaccurate. The objective is to saturate the air with drones, exhausting Ukraine’s scarcer and more expensive, Western-supplied air defences. Only then are smaller numbers of more accurate cruise and ballistic missiles used.
Attritional drone warfare
Russia’s approach to producing and using drones appears to be focused on exhausting Ukraine’s defences through attrition and exploiting the cost difference between large numbers of offensive systems (drones) produced domestically, and significantly more expensive — and scarcer and foreign-supplied — defensive air defence systems.
By contrast, Ukraine, lacking the same production capacity, relies on technological and tactical adaptability, innovation and an effective military intelligence apparatus. As the attack on June 1 illustrated, this can deliver spectacular results.
While not as nimble as Ukraine, Russia’s improvements to the original Shahed-136 show that it, too, can adapt. Moreover, there are indications that production based on a more advanced model, the Shahed-238, with a Chinese jet engine, may have begun.
If Russia can combine its larger defence-industrial base with more advanced technologies, Ukraine’s ability to defend against large-scale air strikes could be significantly weakened.
Ukrainian explosives experts and police officers examine parts of a Shahed 136 military drone that fell down following an air-attack in Kharkiv on June 4, 2025 (Sergey Bobok/AFP/Getty Images)
Authored by:
Richard Connolly
Senior Analyst, Russia/CIS
