Humans may be flawed creatures, but we still generally solve most of our differences without bombing each other. A successful measure to avoid resorting to bombs is “collective security,” which means that a group of humans is more formidable than any given individual.[1] To take the idea further, it means that if small nations are facing a more powerful opponent, it makes sense for them to pool their resources for mutual defense in the form of an alliance. As the alliance grows in strength, the number of potential opponents decreases, because most national leaders will not start a war they obviously are going to lose. As more nations that face a common set of security threats join an alliance, pressure to join builds on remaining neutral states that face the same threats. This is because the military power of the alliance that will defend each member increases as more countries join, and the possibility of being attacked if a state does not join also increases.

Small countries alone cannot efficiently resist an armed conflict, which is why it is important to establish alliances—an alliance minimizes the overall spending required to achieve any given level of deterrence. The question is, how do new technologies enable more equitable burden sharing across alliance structures? Drones have opened the possibility for smaller, less economically powerful nations to contribute more to alliances, and it is in the interest of the United States to support the proliferation of drones to further increase the capabilities of its allies and lessen its defense burdens. This article begins with a consideration of the benefits of alliances from the perspective of larger members, then discusses drones and reviews the preliminary lessons learned from current conflicts. It concludes by arguing that the United States should combine efforts with its allies to support drone proliferation among smaller, less economically powerful allies to improve their capabilities to create strategic effects.

Understanding the Strategies and Goals of Larger Countries

On 4 April 2023, NATO, the world’s most powerful military alliance, became a little larger as Finland formally joined as the alliance’s 31st member; less than a year later, Sweden became the 32nd. Both countries were very motivated to join the alliance, for an obvious reason: Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. When a smaller nation shares a border with a larger power that suddenly invades one of its smaller neighbors, there is a certain logic in seeking strength in numbers and sheltering under someone else’s bigger, stronger umbrella. But from a different perspective, we should analyze and understand why larger countries are so eager to embrace the smaller countries and, more curiously, why they are willing to defend approximately 1,300 km of border adjacent to an unstable, nuclear-armed country. Experience has taught us that other options, such as leaving these states to defend themselves while supporting them with arms and aid, as is being done currently for Ukraine, entail heavy financial and human costs. To understand the value of alliances not only for smaller states but for larger ones, we need to consider the concept of collective security more thoroughly, from the perspective of larger nations such as the United States rather than only from smaller ones.

Great powers such as the United States and China do not need to worry as much about their individual security because they have powerful militaries and large economies, and are capable of defending their own territories. The “Big Five” (China, France, Russia, the United Kingdom, and the United States) also have nuclear weapons to keep rivals at bay.[2] Instead, what these countries must worry about are their interests, their influence, and their ability to shape the world to create the circumstances that allow them to prosper and remain great powers. If we consider the 2022 US National Security Strategy, we can discern a commitment to defending the current international rules-based order.[3] Its values are also critical goals to support global economic prosperity.

The US strategy includes three main approaches to achieve its goals:

• Investing in American capabilities;
• Building a military suitable for great power competition; and
• Building the strongest possible coalitions to defend the rules-based world order.

This means that, rather than turning away nations that are likely to be security consumers, these alliances become more inclusive by accepting countries that are poorer and less powerful. From a security perspective, a coalition of allies allows stronger countries access to build military infrastructure around the world, thus minimizing security costs. Furthermore, strong partnerships allow the militaries of stronger countries to project force far from their own territories, rather than waiting for the dangers to come closer to home. Coalitions also afford access to an effective network of shared interests and values. This benefit is particularly relevant in the area of operations. Military strength nowadays is more and more about resource and human costs, and alliances allow those costs, and their benefits, to be shared among partners. An alliance’s priority is to provide critical deterrence through its conventional capabilities, and it is each country’s priority to provide critical protection for itself.

An often-talked-about subject in the discourse of alliance unity is that of burden sharing. Burden sharing in a NATO context usually is defined in terms of which countries meet the defense spending target of two percent of national gross domestic product GDP.[4] However, burden sharing goes beyond spending targets; rather, it is a concept that should also account for the conventional forces and whole-of-society capabilities each member can activate in the defense of the alliance.

All alliance members meet NATO’s basic standards for training, organization, and equipment; however, not all of them can maintain the kinds and amounts of advanced equipment that others boast. Increasing the capabilities of allied nations that have fewer resources is an important part of many great powers’ strategies for collective defense. In this way, these stronger countries can lessen their own defense burdens, extend their influence, and help smaller nations maintain their sovereignty and national security.

Drones in Current Military Conflicts

In recent and ongoing conflicts, unmanned aerial systems (UAS, or drones) have provided a range of capabilities, including their use as effective standoff weapons. One of the defining aspects of drones is the democratization of intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (ISR) and strike capabilities they provide for actors that previously relied on larger powers for access to such capabilities. The usefulness of unmanned systems is enhanced because they are cheaper and easier to produce than the systems they can substitute for, such as long-range missiles and aircraft. Unlike these higher-end systems, the relatively low cost of drones allows militaries of smaller nations and even armed non-state actors to integrate UAS into their forces. Drones are also relatively easy to use in comparison to missile systems and aircraft, and are quickly becoming ubiquitous in conflict zones. While drones are not taking over the traditional role of many more advanced and complicated platforms and systems, they provide an effective middle ground for forces of various sizes to enhance their operations without breaking their budgets. A closer look at the United States’ use of UAS, the use of drones by both sides in the ongoing Russo-Ukrainian War, and Iran’s supplying of drones to its proxy network enables us to glean valuable lessons from recent history.

The relatively low cost of drones allows militaries of smaller nations and even armed non-state actors to integrate UAS into their forces.

The United States

The United States was among the earliest innovators in drone systems, dating back to World War I. However, it did not use them widely until the Vietnam War, when they were used primarily for ISR. They have been in regular use for both ISR and kinetic strikes against targets in counterterrorism operations since 2001.[5] During its operations in Afghanistan and Iraq, the United States did not have to deal with adversaries’ air defense networks, or combating adversaries with equivalent arsenals, force size, and technology. The pace of innovation with drones remained stagnant for a time, as the United States focused on producing high-quality drone systems in low numbers that could strike or conduct ISR.[6] These systems are among the best in the world, but they are not feasible to field en masse against near-peer adversaries who can take down US drones not designed to avoid air defense networks.

Only recently has the United States begun to expand its use of drones beyond these two traditional roles through the Replicator initiative, which draws on lessons learned from drone innovation in the ongoing war in Ukraine.[7] The Replicator initiative increases the availability of inexpensive drones to provide capability across the force and battlespace, based on the Ukrainian model, for US, NATO, and allied forces. US allies have also absorbed these lessons and begun experimenting to develop their own relatively expendable drone systems to fulfill a variety of roles. Most prominent is the Eurodrone program.[8] Eurodrone is a medium-altitude, long-endurance, remotely piloted aircraft system, developed as part of a European program involving Italy, Germany, France, and Spain. Eurodrone represents a key element of the European defense industry’s answer to the US Replicator program, a drone platform for use by European armies.

The Russo-Ukrainian War

Drones have been a unique feature of the Russo-Ukrainian War because of the scale at which they have been used by both sides in the conflict. Ukraine alone was believed to be losing drones at a rate of 10,000 per month in 2023.[9] As of February 2024, Russia had launched close to 4,600 Iranian-made Shahed drones against Ukrainian targets across the country.[10] Both sides have made extensive use of drones to target enemy forces at all levels of warfare, from tactical to strategic.

The ideal applications for various drone systems and the best ways to deploy them on a modern battlefield are still being developed. However, two things have become clear. First, drones are unlikely to replace legacy systems. Even Russia’s strikes on Ukrainian energy infrastructure have utilized both missile systems and one-way attack drones. In early 2024, Ukraine had to use large numbers of drones to combat Russian offensives because of shortages in artillery munitions. Drones have been a stopgap for Ukrainian artillery deficits, not a replacement for artillery.[11]

Second, as weapons, drones are most effective for precision strikes. Drones may not have the range or speed of missile systems, but on a cost-per-unit basis, they are sufficient to fulfill the same role as missile systems when it comes to long-range strikes. Russia was the first to use one-way attack drones at scale in the current conflict with Ukraine, but Ukraine has also been active in using drones to strike Russian naval assets in the Black Sea and energy infrastructure across Russia.[12] The widespread development of drone technology in Ukraine has given the nation the ability to carry out precision attacks in Russian territory that normally would require cruise missiles or aircraft. Because NATO members banned their weapons from being used to strike inside Russia, Ukraine has become a laboratory for various drone designs that have grown indigenously out of its need to be able to hit Russian targets in Russian territory.

The widespread development of drone technology in Ukraine has given the nation the ability to carry out precision attacks in Russian territory that normally would require cruise missiles or aircraft.

Ukraine has only recently been using drones to target Russian energy infrastructure and has been successful in striking Russian fuel supplies, reducing Russia’s oil and gas processing capability by 14 percent over the course of five months.[13] The impact of this success is opaque, because information from Russia about domestic difficulties affecting its war effort is scarce. One thing is certain, however: Ukraine executed these strikes without using traditional systems for deep strikes at strategically valuable targets. Drones have given Ukraine the ability to impose strategic costs on Russia beyond the battlefield frontlines, by allowing it to target the infrastructure that fuels the Russian war machine, as Russia has been doing to Ukraine. However, the Russo-Ukrainian War is only part of the story of drones in modern warfare.

Iran’s Proxy Network

Iran’s development of indigenous missile and drone technology came out of the lessons it learned in the Iran-Iraq War (1980-1988), which included the so-called War of the Cities.[14] Iraq had a robust arsenal of Scud missiles that it used to target Iranian population centers, while Iran had little ability to respond in kind after it lost Western military support in the wake of the Iranian Revolution.[15] Iran has subsequently been at the forefront of developing a drone arsenal that can enable the nation to strike and impose costs on any adversary at the operational and strategic levels. This arsenal and the technology behind it have been exported to strategic partners—most recently to Russia for its war with Ukraine, but additionally to Iran’s proxies across the Middle East.[16] Hezbollah in Lebanon, Hamas in Gaza, the Houthis in Yemen, and Kataib Hezbollah in Iraq have access to arsenals of Iranian drones that they have used to target Israel, the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, US forces in the Middle East, and other nations.[17] Under crippling international sanctions and taking advantage of lessons learned from the Iranian Revolution, Iran, through its drone technology, has given its proxies the ability to strike Iran’s enemies as effectively as Iran might have, but without direct Iranian involvement.

Drones enable Iran and its proxies to strike more frequently, without taxing the already strapped resources of the network by using missiles or aircraft to bomb targets; yet drones also help them avoid escalation.[18] A network of proxies whose members all have this capability exponentially increases the strategic costs that a country can impose on its enemies. It also varies the costs that Iran can impose: proxies such as the Houthis and Hezbollah are exchanging fire directly with a US ally, Israel, completely altering the flow of global trade and affecting the economic prosperity of US allies, and directly targeting US forces and their operations in the region.[19]

Drone Proliferation Among Allies

There are two parallel lessons to be learned by looking at the Russo-Ukrainian War and the Iranian proxy network: first, allied planners should field drones in large numbers, and second, allies with equivalent standoff capability can have outsized strategic effects on an adversary. Combining these lessons into one policy should be a priority for the United States and its allies. Drones are not effective replacements for traditional systems, a lesson that is clear from the Russo-Ukrainian War, where artillery and other legacy systems are still vitally important. But drones do enable capabilities that are comparable to many legacy systems, and they can have effects that traditional systems might fail to achieve on a modern battlefield. As previously discussed, drones are an ideal system for smaller powers because they enable standoff and deep-strike attacks that otherwise would require an air force, an asset that most smaller powers cannot maintain. During the Nagorno-Karabakh war between Azerbaijan and Armenia, two very small nations with limited resources to support constant air sorties, drones were decisive in taking on strike roles against enemy positions ranging from the front lines to the deep rear.[20] In the Russo-Ukrainian War, neither side has established control of the skies, so drones serve as the primary method of long-range strategic bombing. In the Iranian context, drones have made small militias capable of striking and affecting the operations of a great power.

As Ukraine, and Iran’s proxy network, have proven, smaller forces with drones can create issues for even the most advanced militaries in the world.

Collective security promises that the more powerful members of an alliance, with large, modern air forces, will come to the aid of smaller members that cannot afford such assets. The advent of drones now enables smaller nations to have greater standoff capability than previously conceived. Smaller nations can afford to purchase and produce drone fleets that can create strategic and operational dilemmas for adversaries as a fleet of modern aircraft might be cost prohibitive for smaller nations to procure and maintain. As Ukraine, and Iran’s proxy network, have proven, smaller forces with drones can create issues for even the most advanced militaries in the world.

If NATO and Western allies are serious about improving their abilities to impose strategic costs on adversaries while also observing fiscal responsibility, drones offer much promise, enabling smaller nations to shoulder greater shares of the collective defense burden. The United States and the European Union (EU) at large have already established programs to design cheap drones to fulfill a myriad of battlefield roles, including long-range one-way attack drones. Expanding these initiatives to focus on developing drones that are affordable, not only for the largest economies of NATO but also for the smallest, would maximize the gain for all allied nations.

NATO’s joint force structure and regular exercising is an ideal framework that has been emulated to some degree by Iran in its proxy network. NATO is centered on the collective security and sovereignty of its members, but the defense interests of all are tied together in the name of collective defense. In contrast, the Iranian proxy network is an array of partners that can be relied upon to support Iranian interests.[21] NATO members’ individual efforts to secure arsenals of drones should not distinguish between EU and US tracks, but should support a single coherent policy, so that all NATO members can participate in and have access to the systems that are produced by such an initiative. The fact that Iran’s network of proxies all use and have arsenals of the same cost-effective platform has enabled rapid training, use, and continued innovation to the benefit of all in the network.[22] NATO could pursue a similar strategy, but with the combined resources and technological capabilities of the various allied nations. Common doctrine is already in development for drones across the alliance; now NATO leadership needs to ensure that this doctrine applies to all member states, and that they have the ability to contribute forces that will exact strategic and operational effects, including conventional strike, deep strike, and ISR, against a common adversary in the event of an Article 5 contingency.[23]

We are seeing how the network of Iranian proxies has been activated to support Hamas against Israel by applying whatever distractions and pressure they can to help end the war in Hamas’ favor. In the NATO context, this strategy could play out in much the same way, with the patchwork of smaller NATO states on the alliance’s eastern and southern flanks using arsenals of drones to target an aggressor in a variety of ways, from attacking its mobilized forces, military infrastructure, and strategic assets, to providing ISR for allied forces engaged against the aggressor. Whereas, before, most of these strike capabilities were concentrated in the larger armies of the NATO alliance, drones could potentially democratize capabilities such that smaller nations could play an exponentially more potent role in collective defense. As adversaries have become more powerful, so too can our allies become more powerful through proliferation of drones.

In the context of US alliances in the western Pacific, smaller allies could rely on naval drones in a possible conflict in much the same way Ukraine and the Houthis have done, by being able to exert sea control despite not having the vessels that traditionally exert that control. Naval drones are growing in capabilities, and while many are reminiscent of the fireships of previous centuries, they represent future capabilities that could be developed for smaller nations, enabling them to exert greater power on the high seas at a cheaper cost. Taiwan, for example, could emulate both the Houthis and Ukraine in developing swarms of drones to defeat or heavily damage a potential Chinese invasion fleet. The democratization of capabilities offered to smaller powers by lower-cost drones could easily yield strategic benefits to the United States and its allies, while complementing the more traditional and advanced platforms and systems in US and allied arsenals.

Conclusion

The United States needs strong allies that can help it support the rules-based international order. Ongoing conflicts have offered some preliminary lessons on just how disruptive new technology is to current military operational planning. Drones have been prevalent in several conflicts, demonstrating capabilities that previously were maintained only by the most well-funded militaries. The democratization of capabilities drones offer to smaller, less well-funded forces has enabled these countries to carry out attacks that have produced outsized strategic effects on their adversaries. From Ukraine’s and Russia’s bombardments of energy and military infrastructure to Iran’s network of proxies rerouting global trade and targeting US and allied bases across the Middle East, drones have become a key enabler for both strike and ISR.

The United States and its EU, NATO, and Pacific allies have come to recognize how important drones are for the future of military operations, and they each work individually to develop systems to fulfill the demands of the modern battlefield. However, these efforts, despite being a part of a large network of allies with common security interests, remain centralized around the demands of only a few key nations and firms. As an example, the Replicator program is US-focused and utilizes US firms, while the EU’s Eurodrone program relies on a variety of EU firms but is centered on clients from the most well-funded EU militaries. One of the lessons learned from the Iranian proxy network is that Iran’s success in spreading its own drone capabilities among its proxies enables it to severely impact global affairs. The efforts of all NATO allies and other US strategic partners should be unified into a single program that can develop drones at a cost that would make these capabilities available to more allies, who could then develop their own drone programs and production indigenously. Such a program would dramatically increase the ability of allies who currently cannot maintain highly advanced and expensive systems to share the alliance’s collective defense burden. If the United States and its allies pooled their resources to develop drones for future conflicts, this more efficient approach would bolster allied capabilities and enable allies to take on greater roles in their own security, the defense of allied territory, and the maintenance of the global rules-based order.

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About the Authors

Arian Sopiqoti, Major, Armed Forces Academy, Albania, serves in the Albanian Ministry of Defense.

Zachary Klein is a research associate in the Energy Academic Group at the US Naval Postgraduate School.

This is a work of the US federal government and is not subject to copyright protection in the United States. Foreign copyrights may apply.