Gulf states shoot down Iranian drones with expensive anti-aircraft defenses, ‘like using a Ferrari against an e-bike’ – but their supplies are rapidly dwindling

In retaliation for the Israeli-American attacks that started last weekend, the Iranian regime is opting for a radical strategy: Iran is not only bombarding Israel with swarms of drones and ballistic missiles, as then, but this time it is drawing the entire Gulf region into the war: Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, Oman, Iraq, Qatar, Bahrain, Dubai, Abu Dhabi and even Cyprus, a member of the European Union, were hit – all states that have made their territory and airspace available for American military activities for years. Gas and oil tankers and other ships in the Gulf are also targeted by the Iranians.

The international consequences are colossal, potentially: for stability and security in the Gulf region, for the global economy, the energy sector, aviation and the tourism sector. Tehran’s apparent attempts to set the entire region ablaze also have direct consequences for other wars, such as in Ukraine, which has been trying to defend itself against Russian aggression for years.

Scarcity of anti-aircraft ammunition – such as for the Patriot system – is the last thing Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky wants. “We are aware that a long war will affect the amount of air defense assets we receive,” he said Monday in Kyiv against journalists.

Salvos with dozens of drones

Because it is certainly not pinpricks that Tehran is delivering, with salvos from dozens of drones and missiles, and the stocks of anti-aircraft missiles in the Middle East are rapidly dwindling.

The United Arab Emirates in particular, just over a hundred kilometers from Iran, is having a hard time, with attacks on Dubai international airport, the ultra-luxurious Burj Al Arab hotel and the man-made ‘palm island’ Jumeirah, among others. The Emirates had refused Washington permission in advance to bombard Iran from their territory, but the Iranian regime has no interest in this.

The current retaliation is in stark contrast to that of last summer, when Iran responded to the US Operation Midnight Hammer – a hail of bunker busterbombs on Iran’s nuclear facilities – carried out exactly one attack on the American air base Al Udeid in Qatar. That only happened after the Iranian government had given extensive notice warnedwith the apparent aim of not causing casualties.

There is no longer any such caution. In the first three days of this Gulf War, the Emirates were bombarded with 174 Iranian ballistic missiles, 689 drones and eight cruise missiles. Most of the projectiles were removed from the air thanks to high-quality American defense systems such as Patriot and Thaad. Yet 44 drones penetrated the air defenses and caused heavy explosions that caused civilian casualties: three deaths and almost sixty injuries.

British weapons expert Robert Campbell believes that the Iranians are consciously trying to deplete the stockpiles of Thaad and Patriot anti-aircraft missiles of Israel and the Gulf States by first carrying out attacks with the oldest missiles from the ammunition depots, he said on Sunday to the Financial Times. Only when those supplies run out would Tehran want to launch its most advanced missiles.

Race between attackers and defenders

This has started a race between attackers and defenders, with the most important question being who will run out of supplies first: the Iranians with their drones, ballistic missiles and cruise weapons, or the Gulf states with their air defenses. The disastrous consequences of a shortage of anti-aircraft defenses can be seen almost every day in Ukraine.

The Israeli Defense Forces treasure last weekend that Iran has about 2,500 ballistic missiles. The size of the supply of Shahed kamikaze drones is unknown. It is clear that the Iranian ammunition depots and launch facilities are among the main targets of the Israelis and the Americans.

The tactic of attacking waves with combinations of cheap drones and ballistic missiles is not new. The Russians have been doing this for years in Ukraine, not only to terrorize the population, but also to force Kyiv to use expensive anti-aircraft weapons against relatively cheap drones. The drone swarms of dozens or even hundreds of projectiles are partly intended to saturate radar systems and exhaust air defenses.

The Gulf states are spending a lot of money this week to protect their population, the tourism sector and energy infrastructure. Middle East correspondent Gregg Carlstrom of The Economist compared it Monday with “Using Ferraris to intercept e-bikes”.

Anti-aircraft defenses cost billions of dollars

Deploying systems such as Patriot, Thaad and Arrow costs hundreds of millions of dollars. One Patriot system PAC-3 interceptor costs $4 to $5 million, with the caveat that often two and sometimes even three missiles are fired to intercept one ballistic missile.

The interception of cheap drones in particular leads to an imbalance between the attacker and the defender: Iran is up to twenty times ‘cheaper’ than the Emirates and the surrounding Gulf states. calculated US military analyst Kelly Grieco of the Stimson Center said on Monday, based on public data.

According to her, the Emirates alone spent $1.5 to 2.3 billion (1.3 to 2 billion euros) on anti-aircraft missiles in three days, five to ten times what Iran spent on the missiles and drones they targeted. “In 48 hours, the Emirates have taken a significant bite out of a stockpile of interceptor missiles built up over years,” she wrote. When this Gulf War is over, all countries involved will want to replenish their supplies, which will further increase the scarcity.

Zoom in

The German military analyst Fabian Hoffmann calculated according to The Wall Street Journal that the Emirates should have about a thousand anti-aircraft missiles. Kuwait is said to have only five hundred, and Bahrain less than a hundred. The Gulf states are currently communicating to the outside world that their supplies are well stocked.

The Americans do seem to be concerned about their own weapons supplies, including anti-aircraft defenses, so said anonymous sources told various media in recent days.

President Donald Trump wrote itself on its Truth Social platform that American ammunition supplies have “never been bigger or better” than now when it comes to the “middle and upper segments”. Trump knows that the best quality ammunition stocks are not fully up to standard from his predecessor Joe Biden, who gave away “hundreds of billions” worth of weapons to Ukrainian President Zelensky, Trump said.

Drones made of plywood and Styrofoam

This problem of expensive, ultra-modern air defense against cheap drones also manifested itself in Poland last September, where NATO F-35 fighter planes fired radar-guided AMRAAM missiles costing 1.5 million euros each at ‘decoyed’ Russian decoy drones – made of Styrofoam and plywood – costing a few thousand euros.

The Gulf States can withstand a blow financially, but it is not a healthy economic model. Moreover, the emirs have little influence on the rate of production PAC-3 MSE missiles by Lockheed Martin. Building Shahed drones on a large scale is significantly easier, as Russia – and initially Iran itself – have shown in recent years.

The Gulf countries will undoubtedly learn from Ukraine, where the mass production of anti-drone drones has become an industry of national importance. Last weekend Zelensky offered countries that helped Ukraine survive the extremely harsh winter to make use of this anti-aircraft expertise. “Everyone now sees that our defense experience is largely irreplaceable.”

On Monday evening, Zelensky went one step further in his proposal to help the Middle East: in an interview with Bloomberg he offered to send Ukraine’s top drone defense experts to the Gulf if “the leaders of the Middle East” who have “great relations with Russians” can persuade President Putin to agree to a month-long ceasefire.

Zelensky had not yet received any direct requests for help from Europe or the Middle East on Monday for sharing Ukrainian knowledge about airspace defense.

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