Yesterday, Iron Fist’s prime contractor, Elbit Systems, released a video on YouTube, seen below, which includes clips of the system knocking down quadcopter-type and small fixed-wing drones in testing. The footage also shows tests demonstrating the ability of Iron Fist’s high-explosive interceptors to defeat rocket-propelled grenades, anti-tank guided missiles, and kinetic-energy anti-tank rounds, the latter of which are solid metal darts traveling at very high speed.
…
The development of Iron Fist, originally by IMI Systems (later acquired by Elbit), dates back to the late 2000s, and various improvements have already been made over the years. The U.S. Army was one of the early customers for the system, first testing it as an option for integration onto the Bradley in 2016, and then making a formal decision to do so two years later. The program has faced challenges, but the Army is now actively working to add Iron Fist to at least a portion of its M2A4 Bradley Infantry Fighting Vehicles. Bradleys that receive Iron Fist systems are currently being redesignated as M2A4E1 variants. Just this week, Elbit received a new $228 million contract to supply more Iron Fist systems to the Army over the next three years.
…
Other countries, especially Israel itself, have also worked to integrate Iron Fist onto a variety of other vehicle types. Israeli firms have been, and continue to be, world leaders in hard-kill active protection systems, in general.
^ the above bolded quote should seriously concern you if you desire peace. As Israel becomes more and more a pariah state because of the Palestinian Genocide it will turn to working with other sanctioned world nations like Russia no matter the apparent conflict of interests or differences in ideology, and this technology will ABSOLUTELY be sold to nations like Russia in order to finance the extreme isolation Israel is internationally placing itself into by refusing to stop the genocide.
We have a choice now, we might not later after the technology has already been sold to Russia and Russia has been re-emboldened to launch another war against Ukraine and Europe.
A dominant capacity for this technology MUST NOT wholy be contained within the powers of a genocidal state as it will play a key deciding factor in future conflicts.
All that being said I recommend watching the video, the technology on display is undeniably extraordinary although the idea that friendly infantry should be anywhere near vehicles when this system is turned on is insane why are they in the animations like that??!?!.
As far as I’m concerned, this is obsolescent technology being used to extend the life of an obsolete technology (battlefield armored vehicles). As long as you’re expending expensive ammunition to defeat cheap drones the answer will be to send more drones. Even if you make the ammunition cheap, you can still only carry a limited amount of it. In this situation the advantage will always lie with the attacker.
Then you do not understand modern warfare and you aren’t listening to what the Ukrainian military has learned from the Ukraine war, what they are doing nor what tools they value to keep their soldiers alive. If there is anybody you should listen to about armored warfare and drones, it has to be Ukraine…
You always need an armored taxi, that is a constant in warfare, to think that because “drone beat armored vehicle” that means armored vehicles are obsolete is to reduce warfare to a spatially abstracted rock paper scissors game, which you would know it is decidedly NOT if you understood these things with any level of depth.
here is some homework
https://euro-sd.com/2026/01/articles/armed-forces/48794/countering-the-drone-threat-to-heavy-armour/
Before diving into the analysis of this matter, it is important to note that armoured forces and heavy armoured vehicles have proven indispensable in all recent armed conflicts since 2020, despite the changing and increasingly hostile conditions on the battlefield. Armoured forces continue to play a critical role in modern ground warfare, while many militaries across the globe plan to expand and further develop this branch of service. The tank is not dead, and armoured forces are not going to go extinct in the near future.
Undoubtedly, armoured forces and armoured fighting vehicles (AFVs) have to adapt to the new combat environment – technically, tactically, and doctrinally. However, this has been a normal part of their evolution since the beginning of the 20th century.