U.S. media: Lucas drone falls short of Iran’s Shahed

Pars Today – A U.S. media outlet reported that reverse-engineering Iran’s Shahed drone has posed cost and quality challenges for the U.S. Department of Defense (Pentagon).

The American news-analysis website Jalopnik reported that comparing the Pentagon’s Lucas suicide drone with Iran’s Shahed-136 shows that U.S. efforts to reverse-engineer the Iranian drone have led to reduced technical capabilities due to high production costs. This, the report says, demonstrates Washington’s lag behind rivals like Iran in adapting to modern warfare.

According to the report, the American media outlet Jalopnik highlighted a worrying technological and strategic gap in the U.S. military. It added that the Pentagon’s efforts to reverse-engineer and produce an American version of inexpensive, mass-produced suicide drones like Iran’s Shahed-136 have faced major structural challenges, resulting in a final product that falls short of the original in terms of performance.

Lucas has only part of Shahed’s technological capabilities

The American outlet went on to note that the Shahed drone, as a powerful example of this warfare tactic, is capable of flying more than 1,200 miles, carrying a 40‑kilogram warhead, and reaching a top speed of 185 km/h. Priced at around $35,000, it is well suited for mass production and swarm launches.

Addressing the challenges of reverse‑engineering the drone for the United States, the report wrote that the Lucas drone also costs about $35,000, but may not perform as well as the original Iranian model.

SpecterWorks is also developing a test drone based on the Shahed‑136, known as the FLM‑136, which is capable of flying only 450 miles with an 18‑kilogram warhead. Even if the Lucas drone were to have similar specifications, it would still possess only part of the Shahed’s capabilities, despite being built in what is considered the world’s most technologically advanced country.

The report also points to another fundamental problem: according to other sources, including Forbes magazine, Lucas drones still lack an actual warhead, and tests have so far been conducted only with non‑explosive payloads. A U.S. Army document explicitly confirms that the development of a suitable warhead for these drones is still at the planning stage.

Jalopnik views this phenomenon as a sign of a broader incapacity. While the United States pioneered drone warfare decades ago with sophisticated and expensive systems such as the Predator and Reaper, its rivals—especially Iran—have proven better at adapting to the realities of modern warfare, where the mass use of low‑cost drones plays a decisive role.

The economics of production and Iran’s strategic thinking have produced an outcome that the U.S. system—costly and heavily focused on advanced, complex technologies—cannot easily replicate. In conclusion, the report poses the question, “Is the United States ready for the next drone war?” and answers: “For now, it is not ready enough.”