Drones, water and deterrence: the war in Iran is changing our society and industry

The war against Iran has demonstrated just how fine the line has become between tactical victory and strategic success. Thousands of targets can be struck, fleets crippled and facilities destroyed without eliminating the adversary’s residual potential, restoring freedom of navigation or establishing a sustainable political order. For Italia, France and Germany, geographical distance from the Gulf does not equate to strategic distance: energy, shipping, fertilisers, insurance, the defence industry and Mediterranean security now all form part of the same theatre. All the more so as the scope of security is also changing: cheap drones pitted against expensive interceptors, civilian infrastructure transformed into instruments of coercion, cyber-attacks coordinated with kinetic operations, and industrial supply chains called upon to produce faster than the contending parties can consume. The US assessment paints a picture of unquestionable operational superiority, but this does not equate to the end of the war. According to the White House, during Operation Epic Fury, US forces carried out over 10,200 sorties, struck more than 13,000 targets, intercepted over 1,000 drones and more than 700 ballistic missiles. The targets included over 2,000 command and control centres, 1,450 military industrial facilities, 1,500 air defence systems, around 800 drone-related sites, more than 600 naval targets and over 450 missile systems or depots. The United States Central Command subsequently assessed that over 85 per cent of Iran’s industrial base linked to ballistic missiles, drones and naval capabilities, and also attributed to the operations the neutralisation of 82 per cent of air defence systems and 161 naval vessels belonging to 16 distinct classes. These are US operational estimates, not independent verifications. They do not measure how quickly the sites can be rebuilt or what proportion of the missile and nuclear arsenal has survived.

The most serious information gap concerns, in fact, the nuclear programme. In report GOV/2026/33, dated 4 June 2026, the Director General of the International Atomic Energy Agency noted the declared existence of 22 nuclear facilities and one site outside the complex, but reported that, in early June, the inspectors had only been able to gain access to the Bushehr power station. The Agency was therefore unable to verify the other facilities, the inventory of centrifuges, the suspension of enrichment activities or the location of stockpiles. The latest estimated stock level prior to the suspension of inspections, as at 13 June 2025, was 9,874.9 kilograms of enriched uranium, including 440.9 kilograms enriched to 60 per cent in uranium-235, 184.1 kilograms enriched to 20 per cent and 6,024.4 kilograms enriched to 5 per cent — Implementation of the NPT Safeguards Agreement and Relevant Provisions of United Nations Security Council Resolutions in the Islamic Republic of Iran, GOV/2026/33 – International Atomic Energy Agency – 4 June 2026. The document also notes that on 2 July 2025, the Iranian President signed a law suspending cooperation with the Agency; the inspection agreement signed in Cairo on 9 September 2025 by the Director General and the Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi was subsequently declared invalid by Tehran on 20 November 2025. All this uncertainty forces adversaries to plan on the basis of the most dangerous scenario and makes further pre-emptive operations more likely, without guaranteeing that they will yield better results or information.

The second paradigm shift, which has been extensively tested in Ukraine, concerns the relationship between offensive and defensive costs. An official analysis by the US Department of Defence notes that the Shahed-136s accounted for 66 per cent of Iranian responses between 28 February and 9 March 2026, without compromising US combat capability — Small Drones, Big Problems: A First-Principles Approach to Counter-UAS – US Department of Defence – 8 July 2026 — . However, the effectiveness of saturation attacks is not measured solely by the number of targets destroyed. The war against Iran has produced an impressive military outcome without providing the victors with a strategic conclusion based on reliable data. Demolished installations, reduced fleets and compromised chains of command coexist with three decisive unknowns: the remaining size of Iran’s arsenal, the impossibility of verifying the fate of nuclear material, and Tehran’s ability to shift the pressure from military bases to civilian infrastructure. Relatively inexpensive drones, missiles, cyber sabotage and maritime interdiction can transform Western air and naval superiority into a test of industrial resilience. The absence of decisive effects on the armed forces does not, in fact, equate to the strategic irrelevance of the drones’ effects. When targeting airports, terminals, substations, pumping stations and water treatment plants, the attacker does not need to gain air superiority: they must force the defender to protect too many points simultaneously, distinguish between real and false targets, and deplete interceptors, flight hours, radar capacity and maintenance resources.

These effects lead to an interdependence between electricity and water. The M-Station power station in Jebel Ali, according to the Dubai Electricity and Water Authority, combines 2,185 megawatts of electrical capacity with a daily water production of 140 million gallons, utilising six gas turbines, six heat recovery boilers and three steam turbines. A facility of this kind concentrates economic value, public service and technical interdependence within the same site. Damage to transformers, control systems, seawater intakes or steam generation can simultaneously reduce both power generation and desalination, whilst repairs require industrial components that are not always available within the timeframes dictated by water reserves. On 22 March 2024, DEWA reported a storage capacity of 882 million gallons, set to reach 1,152 million with projects currently underway. Storage absorbs a shock; it does not replace interrupted production, especially if the attack also affects electricity grids and pipelines. Finally, the most dangerous sequence is cyber-kinetic: preliminary intrusion into operational networks, reconnaissance of industrial control systems, disruption of communications, a physical attack and subsequent information pressure on the population. On 7 April 2026, the Environmental Protection Agency, the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency and the National Security Agency issued a joint advisory concerning cyber activities linked to Iran targeting water systems. The defender must therefore protect not only the physical asset, but also the ability to understand its status in real time.

For Europe, the situation in Iran is already an internal matter. In its conclusions of 19 March 2026, the European Council called for a moratorium on attacks against energy and water infrastructure, the coordinated strengthening of the anti-drone and air defence capabilities of Gulf partners, an increase in the assets allocated to EUNAVFOR ASPIDES and EUNAVFOR ATALANTA, and an assessment by the Commission of the implications for energy security, prices, supply chains and migration. It also highlighted the deployment of military assets in the eastern Mediterranean and support for Cyprus. European defence will therefore need to integrate electronic warfare, artillery, cost-effective interceptors, hunter drones, high-end missiles and passive protection, reserving the most expensive weapons for the most dangerous threats.