The Iran war flushed $1.3 billion of Reaper drones down the drain

The U.S. has lost 45 MQ-9 Reaper drones, worth at least $1.3 billion, since the start of its war on Iran, the Washington Post reported Friday.

The drones can cost between $30 and $50 million each, depending on their sensor and weapons payload. The U.S. military has lost roughly 25% of its pre-war fleet in the past five months.

A defense official told the Washington Post that some of the drones were not shot down by Iranian forces, but instead were lost after their communications link to their operators failed. They did not say how many were lost this way.

Observers say the MQ-9 losses are par for the course amid a costly war with Iran.

“The drip, drip, drip of this news shows how much the Trump administration is drawing down U.S. arsenals to support the war in Iran,” Justin Logan, the director of defense and foreign policy studies at the Cato Institute, told RS. “First it was interceptors, then it was naval deployments, now it is drones, and tomorrow it will be something new.”

“U.S. allies in the region know better, which is why, with the exception of Israel and partly the UAE, they are all pressing for deescalation, not a full-on renewal of the war,” Logan said.

To Logan’s point, the U.S. has suffered numerous high-profile and expensive weapons systems losses since the start of the conflict in late February.

An MQ-4 Triton drone, worth $238 million, crashed in an accident over the Persian Gulf in April. An Iranian missile and drone attack on a U.S. base in Saudi Arabia damaged a E-3 Sentry AWACS plane, worth about $300 million, in late March.

The U.S. has also burnt through many of its critical munitions since the war began, including “virtually all” its long-range precision strike missiles, according to sources who spoke to Reuters.

The Pentagon has repeatedly floated requests for Congress to replenish these munitions — which can cost millions of dollars each, and can take years to make — with possible supplemental funding packages worth tens of billions of dollars.

The MQ-9 has proven vulnerable beyond the war against Iran. Yemen’s Houthi Rebels shot down 7 reaper drones during Operation Rough Rider, the U.S. campaign against the group last spring, which aimed to stop Houthi attacks on vessels in the Red Sea. Three of those were shot down in one week in April of last year.

As losses mount, the Pentagon has begun to seek out cheaper alternatives for the costly drone. A Defense Innovation Unit notice posted in July solicited designs for alternatives that can be produced in high numbers at low costs within five years.

The notice said a “reliance on low-density, high-value” aircraft is “unsustainable” against advanced air defense systems.