The Rise of Drone Power

Essential Books to Understand How Uncrewed Systems Are Transforming War, Technology, and Society

It seems that not a day goes by without drones capturing news headlines and receiving due attention across global security and defense forums. Their rapid evolution, along with increasingly innovative employment, greater numbers, and growing complexity, marks the long-anticipated, technology-driven shift in the character of war in the information age.

On the current battlefields of the Ukraine-Russia war, the proliferation of low-cost, commercially modified loitering munitions, ISR networks, first-person-view (FPV) anti-armor drones, and remote-controlled maritime strike platforms is shaping the character of the conflict. Meanwhile, Iran-backed Houthis have disrupted Red Sea shipping using one-way explosive drones in coordination with ballistic and cruise missile attacks. Drones are also prominent in the ongoing Israel-Hezbollah conflict across the Levant. U.S. forces in Operation INHERENT RESOLVE have been under drone and missile attack—for example, the January 28, 2024, attack on Tower 22 near the Jordan-Syrian border, where an explosive drone launched by the Islamic Resistance in Iraq, an Iranian-backed militia group, killed 3 U.S. soldiers and injured 47 others.

From Left to right: An Iranian-made Shahed 101 drone, the remnants of an Iranian-made Shahed 131 drone recovered from Ukraine in Fall 2022, and an Iranian-made Shahed 131 drone recovered from Iraq in 2022. Photo shared by the US Defense Intelligence Agency's Office of Corporate Communications.