That's really neat hah.

The US deployed https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Advanced_Precision_Kill_Weapon... to "cheaply" kill incoming slow munitions. It requires planes in the air but that's sort of table stakes for an operation involving the US in general.

We can make plenty of those rockets. They are cheaper than Shaheds! Though that doesn't count the plane time! $20k per hour per plane at least.

As the cat and mouse game continues, Shahed style weapons used against countries with any meaningful defense, like "drone interceptors" or helicopters or old warplanes, the munitions will continue to evolve towards "Just a guided missile at this point", where the situation again transitions back to the economics of cruise missile vs patriot.

The Hydra pods can be used against any precision weapon up to subsonic cruise missiles, so their versatility and pricetag only gets more effective, while every effort making the Shahed more survivable only makes it more expensive and harder to build.

In an interesting twist, a good air force now ends up doing good work against cruise missiles.

If cruise missiles try to go faster, supersonic, to make these Hydra pods ineffective, they end up getting more expensive rather quick, at which point the $4 million patriot missile makes sense.

The Patriot isn't even a fiscally efficient anti-missile system. The Israeli Iron Dome can intercept subsonic cruise missiles and costs about $100k an interception.

Most "Missile Defense" munitions are expensive because they have to be capable against ballistic missiles, which are much more difficult to intercept. MANPADS are sometimes effective against cruise missiles and they are often cheap and plentiful, though putting them in the right place at the right time is the hard problem there. The Hydra pods are actually better in that case because a modern jet will reposition rather quickly. Then the problem becomes noticing the incoming munitions early enough to get a plane on its tail.

All this still depends on industry to build it though. These missiles are cheap in bulk but that still requires the factory exist, and that isn't always cheap or easy or fast. In Ukraine, drones get a secondary benefit of being a very survivable industry, as it uses entirely commodity components and even 3D printed parts so it can easy disperse and scale however you can manage.

from the last paragraph of the wiki article you linked

> In June 2020, BAE announced they had completed test firings of the APKWS from a ground launcher for the first time

so it seems like they've got them launching from the ground. That seems like a real possibility to defend against these kinds of drones. However, I don't think it's a problem of technology or cost right now but of availability.