Drones & UAVs
The machines rewriting the rules of air power
From $30,000 kamikaze drones that force million-dollar interceptors into the air, to uncrewed fighters that fly wingman for a human pilot — this is the guide to the aircraft that left the cockpit behind.
How Uncrewed Aircraft Rewrote Air Power
The word “drone” now covers everything from a $500 quadcopter to a stealthy jet that can file its own flight plan. What they share is a single missing part: the human in the cockpit. Remove the pilot, and the entire calculus of air power changes — commanders can accept losses that would be unthinkable with a person aboard, and industry can build aircraft to be spent rather than saved.
That revolution is being pulled in two directions at once. At the cheap end, loitering munitions like Iran’s Shahed-136 cost about the price of a family car, yet force an enemy to burn far more expensive missiles to shoot them down. At the expensive end, “loyal wingmen” like Boeing’s MQ-28 Ghost Bat and the U.S. Air Force’s new YFQ-42 and YFQ-44 are near-fighters in their own right — designed to fly alongside crewed jets and take the risks a pilot cannot.
Between those poles sits the whole modern taxonomy: tactical reconnaissance quadcopters, medium-altitude hunters like the MQ-9 Reaper, high-altitude surveillance platforms, and one-way deep-strike drones that now reach more than 1,000 kilometres behind the front line. This guide collects the encyclopedia’s reporting on all of them — and on the doctrinal question underneath it all: in a sky full of machines, does air superiority still matter?
The Uncrewed Spectrum
Cheaper & more numerous ← → costlier & more capable
Loitering Munitions & Deep-Strike Drones
Cheap, expendable, and numerous — the weapons that turned mass back into a virtue.
The drone that changed the arithmetic of air defence. Built in Iran and launched in swarms by Russia against Ukraine (where it is designated Geran-2), the Shahed-136 is a one-way “kamikaze” drone that trades speed and precision for sheer disposable quantity. It cruises low and slow, but a defender who answers each $30,000 airframe with a million-dollar interceptor is losing the exchange even when every shot hits.
Read the full report →A case study in how the deep-strike drone campaign scaled from harassment to strategic effect. On June 12, 2026, Ukrainian long-range drones struck refineries in Tatarstan and a synthetic-rubber plant in Samara — more than 1,100 kilometres from the border — while Russia claimed to have downed 231 drones across 15 regions in a single night. The numbers alone show how cheap airframes have stretched the front line hundreds of kilometres into an opponent’s rear.
Read the full report →Loyal Wingmen & Uncrewed Fighters
Not expendable toys — near-fighters built to fly beside crewed jets and absorb the risks a pilot cannot.
The umbrella program turning the loyal-wingman idea into real hardware. After years of concept work under names like Skyborg and Loyal Wingman, the U.S. Air Force’s Collaborative Combat Aircraft effort has moved into procurement — contracts awarded, prototypes flying, and a future fighter formation where a single F-35 or F-47 leads a flight of uncrewed partners that scout, jam, and shoot.
Read the full report →Australia’s home-grown loyal wingman is growing up. At ILA Berlin in June 2026, Boeing revealed an enlarged MQ-28 Ghost Bat with a wing about 25% larger, lifting maximum takeoff weight to roughly 12,000 lb and adding an internal bay for two AMRAAM air-to-air missiles — days after the drone’s first operations outside Australia.
Read the full report →A milestone in the designation system itself. In June 2026 the Air Force cleared both the General Atomics YFQ-42A and Anduril’s YFQ-44A “Fury” into initial production — the first aircraft ever to carry a fighter “F” designation with no cockpit. Rather than pick a single winner, the service is buying both, with roughly 150 airframes planned by 2030 under Increment 1 of the CCA program.
Read the full report →The Doctrine of Drone Warfare
The hard question beneath the hardware.
Some analysts argue that in the age of drones, hypersonics, and long-range missiles, controlling the sky has quietly become obsolete. This piece makes the opposite case: from the skies over Ukraine to the contested approaches to Taiwan, the ability to deny an adversary the use of the air still shapes ground campaigns, naval operations, and political outcomes — and drones change how you win that fight, not whether it matters.
Read the full report →Uncrewed Systems at a Glance
How the systems in this guide compare across the spectrum
| System | Origin | Class | Status / Cost | What Makes It Matter |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Shahed-136 | Iran | Loitering munition | In use · ~$30,000 | 1,000+ km one-way strike at the price of a car |
| MQ-9 Reaper | USA | MALE hunter-killer | In service · ~$30M | The benchmark armed ISR drone of the 2010s–20s |
| MQ-28 Ghost Bat | Australia | Loyal wingman | Development | Internal bay for two AMRAAMs (2026 upgrade) |
| YFQ-42A | USA | Uncrewed fighter (CCA) | Production · Increment 1 | General Atomics Avenger heritage, low-observable |
| YFQ-44A ‘Fury’ | USA | Uncrewed fighter (CCA) | Production · Increment 1 | Anduril’s software-first, autonomy-led design |
Cost and status figures reflect commonly cited public reporting as of mid-2026; CCA (Collaborative Combat Aircraft) prototypes were cleared into initial production in June 2026.
Why Drones Haven’t Replaced the Fighter
It is tempting to read the headlines — refineries burning 1,100 km inside Russia, $30,000 drones defeating layered air defences — and conclude the crewed fighter is finished. The reality is more interesting. Cheap drones can be jammed, spoofed, and swatted down by cannon and short-range missiles; they are slow, lightly protected, and blind to much of the picture a modern fighter’s sensors build. What they change is the economics of who can afford to fight, not the physics of who controls the sky.
The emerging answer is not drones or fighters but both, fused. A single pilot in an F-35 or F-47 commands a formation of Collaborative Combat Aircraft — sending the uncrewed jets ahead to scout, jam, and absorb the first shots, while the human makes the decisions that still require judgment. That is why the same era that produced the Shahed-136 also produced the YFQ-42 and YFQ-44, and why the question of air superiority matters more, not less.
Frequently Asked Questions
What is the difference between a drone, a UAV, and a UAS?
They describe the same thing at different scopes. “Drone” is the everyday word for any uncrewed aircraft. “UAV” (uncrewed aerial vehicle) refers specifically to the aircraft itself. “UAS” (uncrewed aircraft system) covers the whole package — the air vehicle plus its ground control station, datalinks, and operators — because a modern military drone is useless without the system flying it.
What is a loitering munition?
A loitering munition is a drone that is the weapon. Instead of carrying a missile, it flies to a target area, loiters until a target appears or is confirmed, then dives into it — destroying itself in the process. The Shahed-136 is the archetype: cheap, one-way, and built to be launched in numbers rather than recovered.
What is a “loyal wingman”?
A loyal wingman is an uncrewed combat aircraft designed to fly alongside crewed fighters, taking on scouting, jamming, strike, and decoy roles under a human pilot’s direction. Boeing’s MQ-28 Ghost Bat and the U.S. Air Force’s YFQ-42 and YFQ-44 are current examples, developed under the Collaborative Combat Aircraft program.
Will drones replace fighter pilots?
Not in the near term. The prevailing model is crewed-uncrewed teaming — one pilot commanding several Collaborative Combat Aircraft — rather than fully autonomous air forces. Cheap drones have transformed strike and attrition warfare, but winning and holding air superiority against a capable enemy still relies on the sensors, speed, and judgment that a crewed fighter brings.
Which was the first uncrewed aircraft to get a fighter “F” designation?
The General Atomics YFQ-42A and Anduril YFQ-44A “Fury,” both cleared into initial production by the U.S. Air Force in June 2026. They are the first aircraft to carry the U.S. fighter “F” designation with no cockpit and no onboard pilot.