US Navy Launched Something That Shouldn’t Exist… Iran Can’t Stop It

These drones are not advanced autonomous systems. They mainly rely on satellite navigation and predetermined target coordinates. Once launched, they cannot easily change course to avoid defenses or adapt to electronic interference. Their main advantage lies in their low cost and the ability to deploy them in large numbers.

Detection would occur long before the drones reached visual range.

An E-2D Hawkeye airborne early-warning aircraft flying high above the fleet could detect incoming targets at significant distances. Its AN/APY-9 radar is designed to track small, low-flying objects even in complicated environments. The information is shared across Cooperative Engagement Capability networks, creating a unified sensor picture for the entire strike group.

In practical terms, this allows a destroyer dozens of miles away to fire using data collected by another platform. The carrier strike group therefore operates less like separate ships and more like a single, integrated combat system.

The first defensive responses would likely involve layered conventional weapons. Naval guns firing proximity-fused ammunition can effectively destroy slow aerial targets. Close-in weapon systems such as the Phalanx are built to eliminate threats within a few kilometers of a ship. Rolling Airframe Missiles and Standard Missiles extend that defensive shield much farther from the fleet.

Critics often highlight the cost imbalance in missile defense: interceptors costing millions of dollars compared with drones that may cost only tens of thousands. This imbalance has influenced Iran’s drone strategy, which focuses on overwhelming defenses through saturation and forcing defenders to expend large numbers of expensive missiles.

Yet missile inventories are no longer the only factor.

In recent years, the U.S. Navy has tested directed-energy technologies, including laser and high-power microwave systems, specifically designed to counter drone swarms. Unlike traditional weapons, these systems do not rely on physical ammunition. Instead, they draw power directly from a ship’s onboard energy systems.