Andy Yakulis
Modern Warfare has become a battle of numbers. Yet no longer is the main data point the number of troops but rather the number of systems and their cost. Reporting from the modern battlefields in Ukraine, the Red Sea, and Gaza, and Northern Israel frequently comes with a cost analysis. What was the cost of the missile to shoot down one drone? Or how much did a drone cost to destroy a tank? Mass matters now more than ever because warfare has become democratized. Small, one-way drones - which have effectively become piloted munitions, are relevantly cheap yet extremely effective.
The U.S. military industrial complex has created incredibly complex, expensive, exquisite products for the last half-century. The USS Ford Aircraft Carrier takes the number 1 spot at $13 billion, with other platforms, such as the F35, costing between $80m to $100m per aircraft. While The U.S. was building such systems, China has been focused on cheaper systems that, in mass, can destroy these large systems. Sure, the USS Ford has defenses, but if the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) fires five DF-21 missiles that cost $25m each at the U.S. Navy's crown jewel, only one needs to get through. The cost of the PLAN to destroy a $13 billion asset could be only $125 million. Or about 1% of the cost of its target.
In the Red Sea, the U.S. Navy has been shooting down Houthi attack drones that cost around $40,000 with two $ 1 million missiles. The targeted drone is 2% of the cost of the U.S. missiles required to shoot it down.
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