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The Paltry Economics of Drone Warfare

Wall Street Millennial | January 28, 2026



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In this video we analyze the economics of drone warfare.

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0:00 – 2:23 Intro
2:24 – 4:41 Modern Drone Warfare
4:42 – 8:16 AeroVironment
8:17 – 11:12 Kratos
11:13 Red Cat

Written by Wall Street Millennial

Comments

This post currently has 27 comments.

  1. @FabioCapela

    January 28, 2026 at 10:41 pm

    It's not that supplying those cheap drones can't be done at a profit; it's just that it takes the kind of low cost supply chain that China has to do so. After all, DJI is still profiting on each of its drones or drone parts that get smuggled into Ukraine or Russia, and that despite a lot of the money spent on those drones going into the hands of intermediaries (and for good reason, DJI has threatened to blacklist anyone they catch working as an intermediary to Russia or Ukraine).

  2. @adissentingopinion848

    January 28, 2026 at 10:41 pm

    Btw, it is far easier to create autopilot for a normal plane than for a car in principle. For one, nobody is skimping on money for the autopilot like a Tesla. Second, there isn't any traffic or turned over trucks or pedestrians in the skies aside from airports and flight corridors. Dead reckoning can get you far even with GPS blocked. The issue is keeping a man-in-the-loop for weapons on the drone and the high difficulty of the air defense arms race. The analysis is correct, just poorly explained in relation to autonomous automobiles.

  3. @veerkar

    January 28, 2026 at 10:41 pm

    I do not understand why he says AI cant beat humans at driving and flying. Firstly FSD is better than humans by a factor or 1:12 or better. Second, human fighter pilots are restricted by G-forces, while UAVs are not. In military exercises done by USA – human vs AI – AI won 100 out of 100 times. All ALS landings in bad weather are done by AI and not by humans – even while landing commercial jets with 400 passengers. In fact all landings done today in really bad weather are done by AI and it is indeed illegal to do the same landings by a human alone. Yes humans supervise it but AI is far superior than a pilot with 20 yrs of experience at least in the micro-aspects of flying. And landing and takeoff are by far the most risky part of a flight plan. Clearly AI has beat humans. This creator does not have depth in his research I think.

  4. @rhobot75

    January 28, 2026 at 10:41 pm

    TBH I'm a bit relieved the economics are so paltry. I've been worried about drones ever since I first saw the BlackMirror episode, HATED IN THE NATION.

  5. @ethanboyd7843

    January 28, 2026 at 10:41 pm

    Remember that time AI Industry leaders wrote an open letter urging a pause in dev cause it was so capable it was dangerous? Then they released their product and laughed all the way to the bank.

  6. @JasonPD-m9u

    January 28, 2026 at 10:41 pm

    I generally like most of your analysis here, but I wanted to point out that tasks that humans find easy or hard to learn bears little relevance for tasks that AI finds easy or hard to learn. Human children can run across difficult terrain with debris, and fold laundry. Both of these tasks are extremely difficult for AI. Humans find learning to drive and fly safely moderately difficult, and learning to fly a spacecraft extremely difficult. AI finds flying spacecraft trivial. The US military has already conducted a variety of experiments where AI was able to out dogfight highly trained human pilots. The fairness and applicability of these tests is highly debated, but I don't think we are decades from AI dogfighting supremacy.

  7. @crypto_que

    January 28, 2026 at 10:41 pm

    I saw a Ukranian unit call in its own air support while clearing houses on the battlefield. They realized there were enemy soldiers in the house next door, so they deployed a drone with a l@nd m1ne and dropped it on the house next house over. It was the most Looney Tunes thing I've ever seen.

  8. @MrVanMises

    January 28, 2026 at 10:41 pm

    It's a shame to have yet another article about Musk placed in the video. The video is great as it is, no need to mention Musk (who by the way is a flamboyant nazi)

  9. @rednose1966

    January 28, 2026 at 10:41 pm

    I’m aware of the company that you’re talking about. I almost took some of their training but I would have to have paid for it and it was in the thousands of dollars.

    From what you showed of the lineup of aircraft this company had zero good aircraft being used in Ukraine.

    $90,000 a shot wow talk about going broke.

  10. @tellyboy17

    January 28, 2026 at 10:41 pm

    Seems wrong to deny potential of autonomous flight based on the failure of autonomous driving as the complex realities of modern traffic are a lot harder to navigate than a basically completely obstacle free airspace.

  11. @MooMooMoney

    January 28, 2026 at 10:41 pm

    Nice video! However you are completely and utterly wrong on your point at 11 minutes that autonomous drones will not replace fighter pilots in our lifetime. I think it is naive to assume AI can’t handle arial navigation in the future because it is already being done. Palladyne AI and Redcat already demonstrated AI navigation on a swarm of small drones. This tech is not even hugely funded yet. Also your comparison to full self driving is also wholly incorrect. It is actually easier to navigate in a 3D space using geographic landmarks where there are virtually zero obstacles in the sky and you are not adhering to regulations for a consumer automobile. I don’t think we are far away from seeing fully functioning AI powered small scale drones and later large scale drones such as the KTOS systems. That includes AI navigation and targeting. Anyways I would be happy to hear a counter point but maybe rethink that argument because I think it is way off.

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