[WalterBright]

The marginal cost of a fighter aircraft to shoot down a drone flying slow in a straight line would be minimal, especially compared with the expense of each guided counter-rocket.

As for being targets themselves, the drones would be in enemy airspace so who/what is going to target the fighters?

[myrmidon]

I don't see how you realistically get airframe cost below $200k; you need basically a cropduster with a bunch of electronic equipment and weapon systems on top. That's worth 10 attack drones at least (realistically, US military would probably pay several times that).

> As for being targets themselves, the drones would be in enemy airspace so who/what is going to target the fighters?

Something like a sidewinder strapped under some of the attack drones. If you create the incentive (juicy, trained pilots exposed in slow aircraft engaging at low range) your opponent is gonna adapt. Exactly this evolution happened with Ukraine sea drones (already shot down several russian aircraft).

[WalterBright]

> 10 attack drones

It seems as if you anticipate airplanes being destroyed at the same rate as drones? You're right, that doesn't work.

But the idea of airplanes with machine guns is it is cheap to destroy the drones.