00:00Well, I think we've seen very clearly in the U.S. conflict with Iran, which, of course, is still ongoing,
00:05that U.S. forces are very vulnerable to cheap drones, to ballistic missiles that Iran has been launching against U
00:13.S. bases in the region.
00:14We've seen not only U.S. casualties, but major, very expensive U.S. military assets hit on the ground on
00:22U.S. bases.
00:23And the U.S. is not sufficiently adapted to this new way of warfare.
00:27And Paul Sweeney, Paul Scherr, brilliantly captures this in his foreign affairs essay.
00:33I love it.
00:34Game of drones.
00:36Oh, OK.
00:36That works.
00:37Westeros, their drones, they fear King's Landing's drones.
00:41Exactly.
00:42Paul, what are we learning from the war in Ukraine?
00:46Again, Ukraine seems to be punching way above their weight as it relates to their efforts against Russia with drones
00:52and other technologies.
00:53What are we learning there?
00:55You know, I think we've seen in prior conflicts, drones have played a role, but they've been fairly marginal.
01:01Maybe like how you would think about the role that aircraft played in World War I.
01:05And with the war in Ukraine, we've now transitioned to a world where drones are really foundational to the conflict.
01:12Ukraine is producing over 4 million drones a year.
01:16They are the dominant way that Ukraine is now inflicting casualties on Russian forces.
01:21The front lines are populated with drones up in the sky, watching constantly.
01:27And it's changed warfare on the ground.
01:30It's thinned out the front lines.
01:32It's made them much more three-dimensional, where both Ukraine and Russia are looking at threats from above.
01:37And so it's been, I think it's really no exaggeration to say, a total game changer in how wars are
01:43being fought.
01:43And the thrust of your article is the frustration every single American has, whatever their thoughts are.
01:49Okay, we're really good at building like an F this or an F that jet.
01:53Why can't we build cheap drones in Kentucky?
01:59We should be able to, right?
02:01So, I mean, the U.S. is a much bigger country than Ukraine.
02:03If Ukraine can crank out 4 million drones a year, the U.S. should be able to do far in
02:08excess of that.
02:09The problem is that the Pentagon bureaucracy, the defense industry is so sclerotic, it's so slow, and it's encumbered by
02:18so much red tape and all these perverse incentives that drive towards big, expensive, exquisite weapon systems and make it
02:26hard to build things that are cheap and inexpensive and fast.
02:29Paul, Gerald Ford, aircraft carrier, 13 billion, F-35 Lightning, 90 million per unit.
02:37Sure.
02:38And aren't we worried, Paul Sweeney, about, like, drones killing our soldiers and sailors?
02:44And this goes to the point, Paul, when we think about the Strait of Hormuz, I mean, before the war,
02:50it was, in fact, an open waterway.
02:52One could argue some of these new technologies and the newfound belief in Iran that they, in fact, can control
02:58the strait.
02:58How do you think about that part of the world with the strait?
03:01So I think one of the things we're seeing is that drones make the battlefield more transparent, harder to hide,
03:08and in many ways, much more lethal.
03:10And so it's harder to just defend yourself against these drones and missiles that are coming from above.
03:15So that's true on the front lines of Ukraine.
03:17It's also true in these really narrow choke points like the Strait of Hormuz, where it's easy or easier for
03:24Iran to put in mines, small boats in the water laden with explosives, missiles, drones, to harass ships moving through
03:35the straits,
03:35which is a really tight area, versus trying to protect against that.
03:40Building a protective bubble is really hard to do.
03:42Do you have an advocate in Congress?
03:45Are there anybody in Congress saying that we've got to build $35,000 drones?
03:51Oh, absolutely.
03:53I think we've seen Congress, as well as people in the Pentagon, push for several years on trying to reform
03:59the system, move faster.
04:01Part of the problem here is there's not like one choke point inside the U.S. defense ecosystem.
04:08There's a whole bunch of components that make it harder, some of which have to do with how the Pentagon
04:14sets requirements for its weapon systems.
04:17Some of it has to do with acquisitions processes.
04:20Some of it has to do with money.
04:21And some of it's just cultural.
04:22It's just a willingness to take risks.
04:24Well, I'm going to interrupt physicists and say it's like 95% cultural.
04:31I mean, it's like I'm in Rickover in submarines years ago.
04:34We're addicted to big toys, right?
04:37I think that's very true.
04:39And it's going to require a big cultural change to say, hey, we're going to be willing to go fast,
04:44take risks.
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