Pentagon Rethinks Base Protection in the Age of Cheap Drones

The United States Department of Defense has issued sweeping new guidance on hardening military structures against the growing threat posed by unmanned aerial systems (UAS). The directive, which applies to both domestic installations and forward-deployed bases, marks a significant philosophical shift in how the Pentagon approaches force protection in an era where a commercially available drone costing a few hundred dollars can threaten multi-million-dollar assets.

The updated Unified Facilities Criteria (UFC) documents, overseen by the Office of the Under Secretary of Defense for Acquisition and Sustainment, lay out detailed engineering specifications for blast-resistant shelters, overhead netting systems, and dispersal patterns designed to minimize the damage a single drone strike can inflict on concentrated equipment or personnel.

Why Nets and Concrete Are Back in Vogue

For decades, the US military invested heavily in active defense systems — interceptor missiles, electronic warfare jammers, and kinetic point-defense weapons — to neutralize incoming threats. Those systems remain critical, but the sheer volume and low cost of modern drone swarms have forced planners to revisit passive defenses that were last considered essential during the Cold War.

"You cannot shoot down every ten-dollar drone with a two-million-dollar missile," one senior Pentagon official noted during a background briefing. "The math simply does not work. We need cheap answers to cheap threats."

The new guidance calls for the installation of high-tensile steel-cable nets over aircraft parking aprons, fuel storage areas, and ammunition supply points. These nets, similar in concept to those used on aircraft carriers to catch errant landings, are designed to entangle small UAS before they can reach their targets. Testing at Eglin Air Force Base in Florida reportedly demonstrated that properly tensioned nets could defeat Group 1 and Group 2 drones — those weighing up to 55 pounds — with a success rate exceeding 85 percent.

Reinforced Shelters Make a Comeback

The guidance also revives interest in hardened aircraft shelters (HAS), a staple of NATO air bases during the Cold War that fell out of favor after the collapse of the Soviet Union. Many existing HAS facilities in Europe and the Pacific were allowed to deteriorate or were repurposed for storage. The new directive mandates structural assessments of all remaining shelters and allocates funding for the construction of new ones at priority installations.

Modern designs go beyond simple concrete arches. The updated specifications incorporate blast-attenuating materials, spall liners to prevent fragmentation injuries, and integrated fire-suppression systems capable of handling the lithium-battery fires common in drone impacts. Roof designs now include sacrificial layers intended to absorb the shaped-charge warheads found on increasingly sophisticated first-person-view (FPV) attack drones.

Lessons From Ukraine and the Middle East

The urgency behind the new guidance stems directly from battlefield observations in Ukraine and the Middle East. Ukrainian forces have endured relentless drone attacks on airfields, logistics hubs, and command posts since Russia's full-scale invasion in February 2022. The conflict has demonstrated that even well-defended positions can be overwhelmed when adversaries employ cheap drones in large numbers, often guided by real-time intelligence from surveillance UAS operating at higher altitudes.

In the Middle East, Houthi forces in Yemen have used Iranian-supplied Shahed-type drones and cruise missiles to target Saudi Arabian oil infrastructure, coalition military bases, and commercial shipping. These attacks have shown that non-state actors with limited budgets can project power across hundreds of miles using off-the-shelf drone technology augmented with military-grade guidance systems.

Dispersal and Deception

Beyond physical hardening, the Pentagon guidance emphasizes operational changes. Bases are directed to adopt dispersal plans that spread high-value assets across wider areas, reducing the payoff of any single strike. Decoy programs are also expanding, with inflatable aircraft and vehicle replicas being procured in larger quantities to confuse adversary targeting.

The guidance further recommends the integration of passive detection systems — acoustic sensors, infrared cameras, and low-power radar units — to provide early warning of incoming UAS without emitting the electromagnetic signatures that active radar systems produce. This is particularly important for expeditionary bases where electronic emissions can reveal a unit's position.

Budget and Implementation Challenges

Implementing the new standards will not be cheap. Initial estimates suggest that retrofitting the highest-priority installations in the Pacific theater alone could cost upward of $4 billion over the next five years. Congress has signaled bipartisan support for counter-UAS spending, but the scale of the requirement will force difficult trade-offs within the defense budget.

There are also logistical challenges. High-tensile netting requires specialized installation equipment and trained personnel for maintenance. Hardened shelters take years to design and build, and the construction workforce at remote bases is often limited. The Pentagon is exploring modular, prefabricated shelter designs that can be shipped in standard containers and assembled on-site, potentially cutting construction timelines from years to months.

Analysis: A Necessary but Overdue Shift

The new guidance represents an acknowledgment that the US military's force-protection posture has not kept pace with the rapid proliferation of drone technology. For too long, the assumption was that American air superiority and sophisticated electronic warfare capabilities would render drone threats manageable. The conflicts in Ukraine, the Middle East, and the Sahel have proven otherwise.

The combination of passive defenses, active countermeasures, and operational adaptation outlined in the new guidance is sound doctrine. The question is whether implementation can move fast enough. Adversaries are iterating on drone designs in weeks, while the Pentagon's acquisition system still measures timelines in years. Closing that gap will require not just new concrete and steel cable, but a fundamental acceleration of how the Department of Defense fields defensive capabilities.

What is clear is that the age of uncontested bases is over. Every military installation, whether a sprawling air base in Germany or a forward operating position in the western Pacific, must now plan for the possibility of persistent, low-cost aerial attack. The Pentagon's new guidance is a critical first step in adapting to that reality.