The U.S. Army's $170,000 Attack Drone Competes With $500 FPVs

Forbes

4 days ago

The SwitchBlade 600 is the Army's choice for its LASSO project
New budget documents show that the U.S. Army is making a little headway in its efforts to catch up with Ukraine and Russia acquiring small attack drones like the ubiquitous FPVs. But they also show there is still a very long way to go, and rather than abundant low-cost systems, the Army will be fielding a few expensive systems for the immediate future.
Low Altitude Stalking And Strike
Two years ago, back in July 2023, the U.S. Army announced a new Low Altitude Stalking and Strike Ordnance (LASSO) program. The new weapon was on an 'an urgent capability acquisition pathway to rapidly deliver this capability to the Infantry Brigade Combat Team (IBCT).'
The project was clearly inspired by Ukraine, where small FPV quadcopters were taking out Russian armor at long range, and would give the Army similar capability
'LASSO is a man-portable, tube launched, lethal payload munition, unmanned aerial system. It includes electrical optical /infrared sensor, precision flight control, and the ability to fly, track and engage non-line-of-sight targets and armored vehicles with precision lethal fires. LASSO currently consists of three modules: the launch tube, unmanned aerial system, and fire control station.'
A U.S. marine with a tube-launched attack drone (note gas supply for the launcher)
The big difference here is that LASSO would have an infrared sensor or thermal imager, These are still rare on FPVs because they typically add $200-$500 to the cost, so daytime FPVs generally lack them. And while in Ukraine FPVs are carried in a backpack and launched from a stand, the U.S. Army wanted a tube-launched version. This would be fired out by compressed air or other gas, then unfold its wings, making for a quicker and easier launch but at the cost of some cost and complexity.
The LASSO requirement is for a 20-kilometer range and the ability to destroy armored vehicles including tanks, doing the same job as FPVs,
There are a wide variety of FPVs in use in Ukraine, varying in size, payload and extras. Typically, they cost around $500. Ukrainian drone fundraiser Serhii Sternenko – who has supplied a staggering 200,000 FPVs to the military, and targeted by an assassin as a result -- – quotes $300 for a small 7-inch FPV and $460 for a 10-inch, On the other side, Russian maker Frobotics offers an entry-level model for $315 and heavy lift (20-pound warhead) for $756.
Ukraine is building vast numbers of FPV attack drones
These are made in vast numbers. Ukraine recently announced it had increased drone production to 200,000 per month or about 6,000 per day.
In December 2023 AeroVironment announced that the Army had selected their SwitchBlade 600 for the LASSO requirement. The Switchblade 600, launched in 2020, is the big brother to the SwitchBlade 300 with longer range and a bigger warhead. The Switchblade 300 was used extensively in Iraq and Afghanistan against 'high-value targets' from about 2012. Budget documents showed Switchblade 300s cost $52,914 a shot , but there was no information on the exact pricing of the 600, until now.,
Follow the Money
The U.S. Army's procurement budget for missiles for FY2026, released last month, gives a little more detail on LASSO and the rationale for it:
'Infantry Brigade Combat Teams (IBCTs) lack adequate proportional organic capabilities at echelon to apply immediate, point, long range, and direct fire effects to destroy tanks, light armored vehicles, hardened targets, defilade, and personnel targets, while producing minimal collateral damage in complex terrain in all environmental conditions.' LASSO will 'enable the Soldier to make multiple orbits within the IBCT typically assigned battlespace, to acquire and attack targets within and beyond current crew served and small arms fire'
In other words, doing exactly what FPVs do in Ukraine.
But how many would be acquired and for how much?
The document shows the Army is buying 294 SwitchBlade 600 LASSO rounds at a cost of $170,000 each.
In addition, the Army is also acquiring 54 ground control units; rather than the commercial controllers costing a few hundred dollars seen in the hands of Ukrainian FPV operators, these go for $69,204 each.
This really goes to show what has been observed many times before: that producing high-specification gear in tiny quantities means you pay boutique prices.
That tiny quantity will limit the number of operators trained, and they are not going to be firing a lot of live rounds in training.
The Javelin missile costs more than SwitchBlade 600, has a much shorter range, and requires the ... More target to be within sight
It is worth noting at $170k a shot only looks extravagant in the context of the hardware used by Russian and Ukraine. By military standards it is fairly normal. The same procurement budget shows the Army's latest batch of Javelin anti-tank missiles costing $221k apiece – and the reusable control unit needed to fire them is another $208k.
And if that sounds pricey the Army's new hypersonic LRHW missile will cost a whopping $36 million a time. 'Expensive' is all a matter of what you are used to.
FPVs For the Army
In another budget though, we find that the Army is also getting something more like the FPVs used in Ukraine via a very different program.
The Army's Aircraft budget for FY2026 includes money for 'FPV/PBAS' – 'PBAS' being 'Purpose Built Attritable System' which is the Army's new buzzword for expendable drones. The PBAS will carry a variety of 'lethal/non-lethal armaments and munitions.' As in Ukraine these may be fitted along with the battery immediately before launch.
One PBAS system consists of 'First Person Viewer (FPV) goggles, controller, leader display, two 10" air vehicles and four 5" air vehicles' and costs $34,826. Depending on the other items, the drones are likely around $5k each.
Making drones in the U.S. will always be more expensive because they cannot simple use low-cost Chinese components like the Ukrainians and Russians, and labor and other costs will inevitable be higher. $5k may be expensive by Ukrainian standards, but it will conform to U.S. military specifications, and the production run is small.
Considering that only 1,057 systems are being ordered, the $5k price tag may be the best that can be expected. It does at least mean that this program is delivering more than 20 times as many attack drones as LASSO for less total cost.
The PBAS requirement is being met by a variety of suppliers, likely including Neros, previously noted for supplying thousands of FPVs to Ukraine. Neros co-founder and CEO Soren Monroe-Anderson told me that in Ukraine he was told that any firm wishing to supply the market needed to be able to supply 5,000 FPVs a month or go home, and their business is based on large numbers of low-cost drones.
Neros' Archer is a low-cost, U.S.-made attack drone currently being supplied to Ukraine
This week Monroe-Anderson told Defence News that Neros is aiming to be able to produce 10,000 drones monthly by January, and that the longer-term vision a factory to produce one million drones per year with the U.S. Defense Department as its primary customer.
The Real Battle
These budget documents reveal the battle inside Army procurement between traditional legacy suppliers and high-cost established products against disruptive newcomers offering low-cost tech in vast numbers.
To an outsider, the way forward might seem obvious. But the defense business has its own way of working. In Ukraine and Russia, FPVs were so vital that many soldiers started out buying drones with their own money until the military procurement process finally started supplying them.
Another chink appeared this week with an Army call for solicitations, with the goal of acquiring thousands of drones rapidly at a cost of less than $2k a unit. They want more, faster, cheaper than LASSO.
Maybe next year will see the Army putting its money behind small drones in a big way. But an entrenched bureaucracy is a tougher opponent to shift than a dug-in tank battalion.