​Are Drones Effective at Hunting Iskander Ballistic Missile Launchers?

Key Points:

• Ukraine faces significant challenges in destroying Russian Iskander missile launchers due to the short window of opportunity between launcher positioning and missile launch, which can be as brief as minutes.
• Ukrainian ballistic missiles capable of targeting these launchers are not in mass production, and U.S.-supplied ATACMS missiles are limited, leaving drones and loitering munitions as the primary available options.
• Drones, while effective, have limitations such as slower speeds and reliance on continuous tracking to hit moving targets, but Ukrainian forces have successfully used them to destroy high-value missile launchers like the S-400 and Bastion-M.
• Operations targeting missile launchers rely heavily on accurate intelligence, continuous reconnaissance, and the ability to penetrate Russian air defenses, with some successful strikes already conducted on concealed or predicted deployment sites.
• Future efforts will likely involve scaling up drone missions and refining tactics to improve the effectiveness of strikes against mobile missile launchers amid ongoing intelligence and operational challenges.