Silent Swarms

Iran, Russia, and the New Drone Warfare Threat to the Modern World

A new class of weapon is reshaping modern warfare: low-cost, scalable, increasingly autonomous drones capable of striking cities, infrastructure, and military targets with unprecedented precision — and the technology is spreading fast. Drawing on the drone programs of Iran and Russia and the lessons of the first large-scale drone conflict in Ukraine, Silent Swarms examines how unmanned systems are changing the balance of military power, the growing threat to critical infrastructure, and what the next generation of autonomous warfare may look like.