alt.hn

3/5/2026 at 6:27:33 PM

US asked Ukraine for help fighting Iranian drones, Zelensky says

 https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cr5llg0e9g9o

by tartoran

3/5/2026 at 7:23:44 PM

Did they say "thank you" and "please"?

by akie

3/5/2026 at 7:38:38 PM

Most importantly, did they wear ties?

by zerr

3/5/2026 at 9:41:47 PM

To be fair, probably yes.

And they likely used hair style that requires absurd amount of maintennance. If there were women in the group, they likely used expenasive and painful body modifications on top of that. Republicans have own style, they are big on looks, after all.

by watwut

3/5/2026 at 8:09:43 PM

Did they have the cards?

by strangattractor

3/5/2026 at 7:40:44 PM

They didn't when announcing to the world they had started the war. Unbuttoned shirt, no tie, baseball cap, from mar-a-lago...

by verdverm

3/5/2026 at 8:21:52 PM

Jon Stewart took exception: "This is how we're doing this? 2 am? Mar-a-lago basement? no lighting? You don't even have one of those influencer halo things? You just go down in the basement? and this is what we're wearing? Blazer, no tie, shirt unbuttoned? Looking more like the father of the bride settling up with the caterer? ... and not to nitpick, but baseball hat? ... " and it goes on.

by skeeter2020

3/5/2026 at 8:30:37 PM

JS was how I first learned about the conditions of the announcement

For being satire, it's such a good source for perspective on the headlines

by verdverm

3/5/2026 at 7:19:21 PM

He also said that gulf states expended 800 patriot missiles (about 1 year of production) which is more than Ukraine got over the whole war

by yread

3/5/2026 at 7:48:30 PM

Asymmetric warfare, a concept that costed the USA a few trillions before. A patient observer of the war in Ukraine could have updated some war doctrines. If you are an American tax payer, I would understand it if you were banging your head on the table right now. These flying lawn mowers are perfect for a Denial of Dollar (DoD) attack.

by exceptione

3/5/2026 at 8:01:56 PM

> A patient observer of the war in Ukraine could have updated some war doctrines.

A patient observer? Any random idiot of the street that cares to watch the news occasionally could've figured that out.

> If you are an American tax payer, I would understand it if you were banging your head on the table right now

Oh I am, and my representatives hear from me very, very often. Unfortunately, it falls on deaf ears. Seemingly no one around me cares, and our leaders certainly don't. I feel like I'm going insane and living in some kind of weird bizzaro world.

by thewebguyd

3/5/2026 at 8:10:22 PM

Shooting Patriots at flying lawn mowers (I suppose you mean Shaheds, Gerberas, and the like) is crazy. Patriots are key to shooting down ballistic missiles.

To the best of my knowledge, the explosives-laden lawn mowers flying over Ukraine are mostly destroyed by cannon fire from the ground, cannon / machine-gun fire from aircraft (including converted GA aircraft), and interceptor drones.

I expect the US armed forces to be testing oodles of various cheap drones by now. E.g. the US has used Shahed-lookalike drones while attacking Iran recently.

by nine_k

3/5/2026 at 8:16:07 PM

I believe THAAD is for ballistic

Patroits for cruise missiles and jets

Other for one way suicide drones

I'm unsure if Ukraine has used patroits against ballistics. My understanding is that is a low count in the Russian mix. Cruise missiles and jets are their primary targets in Ukraine (aiui)

by verdverm

3/5/2026 at 8:00:06 PM

So you can only sustainably use 2.2 patriot missiles per day?

by BurningFrog

3/5/2026 at 7:36:59 PM

US just have too much money as moving to use interceptor drones is very simple when you have the need.

Russia and Ukraine both ultimately scaled up volunteer started development and production of that "fastest drone on Youtube" for the interceptor role. Cheap, simple, and works against pretty much any prop-driven drone used there.

https://www.reddit.com/r/CombatFootage/comments/1rigqam/oper...

Russia did start to use those hobby jet engines instead of props on the attack drones, and that made them go 600km/h instead of 200km/h. I'm yet to see the interceptor drone for that - it will also have to use, while smaller, such a hobby jet engine. Again laughably cheap - $3K Alibaba. (there are some other options too, i think we'll see them in time too (if anybody have few mils to burn - ping me :). Anyway, the guys are having wonderful time as their hobby became the eye of the global multibillion hurricane of hot military tech. Even the Blackwater guy - the one who was riding the money tsunami back in the Iraq time - got into it by just recently becoming some C-exec in a pre-IPO Ukranian drone developer)

by trhway

3/5/2026 at 7:53:32 PM

AA artillery (radar guided, I'm sure even better improvements with modern tech could be made) seems like a pretty easy win here as well? Cheap bullets, downside being populated areas might impose a risk due to low-flying objects and the interception trajectories needed.

Something like the Phalanx only not $50k/burst.

by phil21

3/5/2026 at 8:13:29 PM

> Something like the Phalanx only not $50k/burst.

i was going to say, CRAM would be effective at a close, slow moving, predictable target. The rounds self-destruct based on a timer if they miss so you're not raining bullets all over the place. It's is also portable and can be parked almost anywhere. I'm not sure if the burst is configurable but slow moving drones are easier to hit than a missile so it seems like the burst duration could be turned down too. You'd have to figure out a way to keep them from shooting down _everything_ though.

https://youtu.be/HbhOUUAPvM4?si=LCiZmTdCArD_ZN_q

by chasd00

3/5/2026 at 8:01:23 PM

> low-flying objects and the interception trajectories needed

that is the key. It is much more easy from all the aspects - logistics, cost, agility, etc... - to patrol, discover and intercept from a higher flying drone. The drone can (and will be) added with AI (already some) and can come closer for the AI to work better, to make sure and can abort the attack if there is a mistake, while AI on classic radar guided AA requires expensive optics to do that at distance.

>radar guided

FPV, in visual and IR, cost pennies and available in millions of units from Alibaba, while those military radars cost a lot and not many of them are available.

The radar guided AA is used and works where needed and there not much other options - like for cruise missiles, 850km/h. You can see videos - the window of opportunity is usually short as cruise missile is also relatively low flying.

by trhway

3/5/2026 at 8:43:08 PM

That's really neat hah.

The US deployed https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Advanced_Precision_Kill_Weapon... to "cheaply" kill incoming slow munitions. It requires planes in the air but that's sort of table stakes for an operation involving the US in general.

We can make plenty of those rockets. They are cheaper than Shaheds! Though that doesn't count the plane time! $20k per hour per plane at least.

As the cat and mouse game continues, Shahed style weapons used against countries with any meaningful defense, like "drone interceptors" or helicopters or old warplanes, the munitions will continue to evolve towards "Just a guided missile at this point", where the situation again transitions back to the economics of cruise missile vs patriot.

The Hydra pods can be used against any precision weapon up to subsonic cruise missiles, so their versatility and pricetag only gets more effective, while every effort making the Shahed more survivable only makes it more expensive and harder to build.

In an interesting twist, a good air force now ends up doing good work against cruise missiles.

If cruise missiles try to go faster, supersonic, to make these Hydra pods ineffective, they end up getting more expensive rather quick, at which point the $4 million patriot missile makes sense.

The Patriot isn't even a fiscally efficient anti-missile system. The Israeli Iron Dome can intercept subsonic cruise missiles and costs about $100k an interception.

Most "Missile Defense" munitions are expensive because they have to be capable against ballistic missiles, which are much more difficult to intercept. MANPADS are sometimes effective against cruise missiles and they are often cheap and plentiful, though putting them in the right place at the right time is the hard problem there. The Hydra pods are actually better in that case because a modern jet will reposition rather quickly. Then the problem becomes noticing the incoming munitions early enough to get a plane on its tail.

All this still depends on industry to build it though. These missiles are cheap in bulk but that still requires the factory exist, and that isn't always cheap or easy or fast. In Ukraine, drones get a secondary benefit of being a very survivable industry, as it uses entirely commodity components and even 3D printed parts so it can easy disperse and scale however you can manage.

by mrguyorama

3/5/2026 at 9:54:31 PM

from the last paragraph of the wiki article you linked

> In June 2020, BAE announced they had completed test firings of the APKWS from a ground launcher for the first time

so it seems like they've got them launching from the ground. That seems like a real possibility to defend against these kinds of drones. However, I don't think it's a problem of technology or cost right now but of availability.

by chasd00

3/5/2026 at 10:25:14 PM

Ukraine has been using originally air-to-air missiles AIM-120 launching them from the ground.

by trhway

3/5/2026 at 7:33:45 PM

Well, Ukraine is, by necessity, the leader in defending against drone attacks.

Ukraine wants more Patriot air defense missiles in exchange. A reasonable deal.

by Animats

3/5/2026 at 7:59:29 PM

Certainly one which could have occurred to America prior to a few thousand of them flying over Ukraine.

by adampunk

3/5/2026 at 8:14:25 PM

Patroits are not for shahed interceptions, that's a losing financial equation. They are used for the iskanders and hypersonic like missiles

by verdverm

3/5/2026 at 10:21:55 PM

The point is it takes an enormous fucking ball sack to refuse help to Ukraine in their hour of need while Iranian drones are raining down on their citizens and then when we need some help to ask them for their expertise

Just history-textbook level gall.

by adampunk

3/5/2026 at 10:35:59 PM

I think I meant to respond to the same comment you did, instead of yours

I 100% agree with you, the discrimination is shameful

by verdverm

3/5/2026 at 8:58:20 PM

You have to shoot back with what you've got that's in the right place.

by Animats

3/5/2026 at 9:20:25 PM

Not always, both Ukraine and Israel make judgement calls in practice.

by verdverm

3/5/2026 at 8:28:06 PM

Useless if there isn't any amo left for them.

by sschueller

3/5/2026 at 10:25:24 PM

There's been so many things I didn't have on my 2026 bingo card I've lost count...

Can't we get back to some form of normality soon? I'm happy to take another pandemic instead of the current state of the world.

by Flundstrom2

3/5/2026 at 10:40:15 PM

That's the worst it got ... yet.

by 1718627440

3/5/2026 at 9:47:30 PM

Ukraine should request strong cards in exchange.

by comonoid

3/5/2026 at 8:06:27 PM

For the anti-drone drones, the factory for the non electric components is row after row of 3D printers, the drones only need to work for one mission. I posted this earlier.

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47208567

by stevenwoo

3/5/2026 at 7:14:14 PM

Ukraine should refuse to help barring a commitment to continued support and support of their preferred peace plan.

by cdrnsf

3/5/2026 at 7:19:24 PM

While I love the idea of sticking it to Trump, this is the wrong approach. The right approach (which Zelensky is doing) is for Ukraine to sell defense drones to countries that now need them (US, Isreal, Gulf States).

Ukraine gets money while scaling their manufacturing and everyone else gets drones that actually work and are continually being refined in the field.

by mekdoonggi

3/5/2026 at 7:35:12 PM

What are the self defence drones against Shaheds at this time? I thought Ukraine was shooting them down with F16s, Gepards and from helicopters.

by chinathrow

3/5/2026 at 7:55:55 PM

Drone vs drone interceptors in the big deal in Ukraine right now.

by dmix

3/5/2026 at 7:37:05 PM

They have a new interceptor that looks like a big bullet with a set of props on the back end.

This article has a representative image: https://www.yahoo.com/news/articles/us-qatar-discuss-acquiri...

You can find videos of their use too

by verdverm

3/5/2026 at 7:41:38 PM

Zelensky has not yet sold anything.

He perfectly understands that whatever Ukrainian military technology is sold to US, Israel, Gulf States will be shared with russia moments later.

by EB-BarringtonII

3/5/2026 at 7:24:39 PM

If Zelensky wants to turn it into a capitalist enterprise then he should be careful with that game, because US could easily ask to be given hard assets in return for the $100B+ in aid we give them, or just reduce aid by exactly the amount they are charging for their drone help.

by mothballed

3/5/2026 at 7:26:54 PM

US direct aid is near zero at this point. The new deal is the EU paying for most of the military supplies.

Ukraine is well positioned to be a major arms supplier for the new drone warfare reality. No one has the experience they do.

by verdverm

3/5/2026 at 7:42:50 PM

US to Ukraine aid under Trump, for more than a year now, is exactly zero dollars.

by EB-BarringtonII

3/5/2026 at 7:50:19 PM

$400M is directly allocated for 2026.

https://www.osw.waw.pl/en/publikacje/analyses/2025-12-19/us-...

by mothballed

3/5/2026 at 7:56:57 PM

Quoting your article:

Congress has merely secured the financial pool; the decision on whether and how the money will be spent ultimately lies with the Secretary of War (Defense).

by coryrc

3/5/2026 at 8:04:18 PM

This is such a cunningly disingenuous portrayal though when you're just leaving it at that, the US has provided billions in aid already and allocated hundreds of million more for this year. Yet the counter argument here is to just ignore all of that and pretend like they've gotten zero through omission of all the times they haven't, while relying on a totally uncited assertion that none of this year's allocation has been spent.

by mothballed

3/5/2026 at 8:32:01 PM

Sure but the question is are they helping the U.S. that helped them. It's pretty clear that the Trump administration is a completely different beast than typical US administration. Look at things like its pro offensive war stance (see unofficial name change of DoD) or that it does not support Ukraine (see lack of funding/intelligence since Trump). Maybe Ukraine will think it's supporting the Americans that helped them and hurting the Americans that are pro or compromised by Russia by withholding aid and letting Trump wallow in what he's reaped.

I'll add that trump has made clear that U.S. administrations are not beholden to previous international policy decisions and so unless congress reins in the executive or trustworthy actors hold the mantle again other nations should treat the US with short term policy decisions in mind and not rely on long term reciprocation.

by greycol

3/5/2026 at 7:16:49 PM

They should take payment up front.

by idontwantthis

3/5/2026 at 7:50:08 PM

Good thing this isn't actually a war according to everyone in the administration

and they just annouced it's likely going through September (which means until end of year)

and they are now dropping 2000 pound bombs on targets next to civilians

https://www.politico.com/news/2026/03/04/evacuation-middle-e...

> "U.S. Central Command, meanwhile, is asking the Pentagon to send more military intelligence officers to its headquarters in Tampa, Florida, to support operations against Iran for at least 100 days but likely through September, according to a notification obtained by POLITICO"

(billion dollars a day and that's before replacing all the weapons)

by ck2

3/5/2026 at 7:57:25 PM

Is special military operation.

by _alaya

3/5/2026 at 7:49:35 PM

The real story is that the Patriot and other interceptor stockpiles Zelensky's asking for are now critically low, and tens of thousands of soft targets are hard to defend against cheap drones. This war is on course to set off a truly unprecedented global energy crisis within days, and the USA/allies don't currently appear to have any plan to fix it.

by themgt

3/5/2026 at 7:58:16 PM

> on course to set off a truly unprecedented global energy crisis within days

That's not exactly how oil supply works. There's plenty of stockpiles which take months to burn through and only some places depend on Iranian oil. China is their biggest buyer and it's around 13.4% of China's oil imports.

by dmix

3/5/2026 at 9:08:31 PM

it's not just about iranian oil. The strait is blockaded. Plus refineries in Kuwait, KSA and Bahrain were targeted. And LNG facilities in Qatar - which stopped and restarting will take ~1 month at least. Leading to this

https://tradingeconomics.com/commodity/eu-natural-gas

Gas in EU is cca 100% more expensive than a week ago.

by yread

3/5/2026 at 8:09:42 PM

>the USA/allies don't currently appear to have any plan to fix it

Their plan is to bomb Iran into the stone age so it can't produce any more drones or missile launchers. It's questionable whether they can succeed though.

by logicchains

3/5/2026 at 8:25:18 PM

In any relevant dimension Iran is about 4X or 5X Iraq. Even Dubya knew you couldn't win in Iraq from the air.

by Zigurd

3/5/2026 at 9:28:14 PM

Strategic bombing has never achieved it's objectives.

by idontwantthis

3/5/2026 at 8:38:00 PM

it is not questionable - they will no succeed. if this is how you "succeed" we would have already "succeeded" long time ago

by bdangubic

3/5/2026 at 7:24:09 PM

This is like that episode of SG-1 where Baal comes to ask O'Neil how to fight the Replicators.

"I'm sorry, we must've had a bad connection there, for a second it almost sounded like you were asking me FOR HELP"

by moffkalast

3/5/2026 at 6:52:58 PM

One only needs to look to Ukraine for how this might play out in the long-run, remixed a bit.

1. Neither side has been unable to stop the other from mass producing drones. Too easy to build in small facilities, whack-a-mole scenario.

2. Interceptors will become depleted, more "squeakers" will get through as time goes on.

Some graphs: https://bsky.app/search?q=ukraine+drone+graph

by verdverm

3/5/2026 at 7:17:34 PM

It's important to separate the short range quadcopters that are easily built in small workshops from the long distance winged drones that can weigh several hundred pounds (like the Shahed drones).

The latter, as they're built by Russia currently, require a decent size facility to build en mass. It's not the kind of thing Hamas could build in their tunnel system, for example.

I agree with your second point that interceptors will become depleted though and this is a serious problem.

by KK7NIL

3/5/2026 at 7:22:01 PM

Ukraine is building long range drones as well. Look to the strike stats inside Russia, many well over 1000km.

The IRGC is significantly more resourced than Hamas, building enough to fire off 100s a week should be no issue for them. They can build ballistic missiles, they twice struck an oil refinery in Bahrain today: https://bsky.app/profile/elhamfakhro.bsky.social/post/3mgd5o...

by verdverm

3/5/2026 at 7:42:59 PM

I agree, it would be hard to stop Iran from producing a significant number of long range drones (hard to stop it from getting the parts it needs when it route them through the Stans or the Caspian sea).

by KK7NIL

3/5/2026 at 10:07:21 PM

Note that neither Ukraine or Russia have air supperiority. It would be much harder for IRGC to build and launch hundreds of drones with basically predators stalking the sky & strikes from manned jets availalbe on short order.

by m4rtink

3/5/2026 at 10:38:28 PM

Until the ammo runs dry, those birds in the sky need something to fire, and contrary to what dear leader says, we don't have a forever supply and usage is significantly above production.

by verdverm

3/5/2026 at 7:22:56 PM

Fight fire with fire. Anti-drone drones that are near cost parity. Or make some investments to develop, cheap, mobile, relatively short ranged point-defense systems. A middle ground between CWIS and CROWS or a CROWS-like system optimized for drone defense. The engagement distance will be close, but it turns the asymmetry back around.

by choilive

3/5/2026 at 7:28:06 PM

This is what Ukraine is doing, but it will always be imperfect. Shahed style drones don't fly a straight path. Ukraine has built out an auditory detection network using cheap phones, has mobile response teams for different types of incoming threats, yet it is still not enough.

Given the resources we are using today, while still seeing drones and ballistics get through, does not bode well for a 100% reliable system.

by verdverm

3/5/2026 at 9:38:36 PM

Is that a squeaker, or a squirter?

by mwpmaybe

3/5/2026 at 7:46:59 PM

[dead]

by Helloworldboy

3/5/2026 at 7:37:22 PM

Reminder that the US is primarily responsible for the precision strike killing of at least 165 school children[1].

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2026_Minab_school_airstrike

by coffinbirth

3/5/2026 at 7:44:34 PM

I haven't seen an update to who fired the missiles (there were two that hit the schoole), US or Israel

Good thread with nuance: https://bsky.app/profile/mikeblack114.bsky.social/post/3mgbd...

by verdverm

3/5/2026 at 7:51:56 PM

It doesn't really matter, they are both responsible, because both attacked Iran illegaly. The major role of course has the US, Israel alone can't do much.

by coffinbirth

3/5/2026 at 8:01:33 PM

Certainly, I agree, the discussion I linked is more about the double tap aspect that likely resulted in the majority of the murders

by verdverm

3/5/2026 at 7:44:29 PM

[dead]

by Helloworldboy

3/5/2026 at 7:44:00 PM

Yeah because we haven't seen innumerable similar lies [0] in the past, with lies about deaths and lies about who fired the weapon.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Al-Ahli_Arab_Hospital_explosio...

by BJones12

3/5/2026 at 8:01:46 PM

Convenient, right? That doesn't make the war crime(s) the US is responsible for simply disappear.

by coffinbirth

3/5/2026 at 8:15:23 PM

We'll soon have drones fighting drones, with few or no lives at risk. Like countries burning piles of money until one runs out.

by carabiner

3/5/2026 at 8:57:51 PM

That is already happening in Ukraine.

by TiredOfLife

3/5/2026 at 8:20:23 PM

Name your price, Volodymyr.

by FrankWilhoit

3/5/2026 at 8:15:13 PM

All this shit to distract from the Pedo files... USA has become Israel puppet state.

by juliusceasar

3/5/2026 at 7:17:04 PM

done… in exchange for 100 nukes

by bdangubic

3/5/2026 at 7:56:52 PM

Trump should stop bootlicking Putin then and give Ukraine serious long range ground to ground missiles. Time for Putin to pay higher price for being a fascist scum.

by shmerl

3/5/2026 at 7:31:34 PM

[flagged]

by CrzyLngPwd

3/5/2026 at 7:27:47 PM

This means that there’s a ground invasion… Iran is just as mountainous as Afghanistan. This will be a disaster.

by chaostheory

3/5/2026 at 7:57:42 PM

If you look at the map, there is no place to stage it. The border with Turkey is very small. Staging in Iraq would mean troops under attack from both sides even before they cross the border.

by braincat31415

3/5/2026 at 9:36:13 PM

The Kurds soundly control a mountain land corridor between Iraq and Iran, and have controlled that since even before the recent attacks. Iran is not in a position anytime soon to close that without air power that they don't have.

I don't think staging light infantry will be a problem but I don't think they'll successfully break out of the mountains, certainly not into any land that isn't already ethnically Kurd (or Baloch, but that's in the other corner of the country).

by mothballed

3/5/2026 at 8:01:13 PM

He also went on to say that Lionel Messi asked him for tips on corner kicks.

by EnPissant