I disagree. For yrs on this forum, I have remained largely silent on the idea that the F-35 will be the last manned fighter platform. This Iran to Israel attack using UAV pretty much reduced the strength, if not completely dispelled, that argument.
Technically speaking, a UAV is an airplane. Were the Iranian UAVs remotely piloted? That is important. For certain, a manned fighter is more sophisticated, but why? Most arguments centered around the fact that we need to keep the pilot alive, but that is not all. The manned airplane is more sophisticated because we want to give the pilot all the information he needs to make decisions. The airplane have the cockpit from which he can see outside, and various sensors to give him information beyond his human view. Current UAV do not have the same level of sophistication. At least not yet.
These Iranian UAVs were probably just 'dumb' models. Launch and forget. INS guidance would get them to where they were programmed to be, then dive to the ground. Were they aware that they were radar 'painted' by manned fighters before they were shot down? Probably not.
So, would we have a smarter UAV to go after other UAVs? Am sure we are heading in that direction. But then it begs the question of how smart do we want this UAV --
ON ITS OWN -- before we reach the point of putting a pilot on it. Now we are back to square one -- the manned fighter. For remotely piloted UAV, the communication link is the weakest part, so we are going to add AI to supplement the grounded human pilot. But then it begs the original question of how much AI before we are back to square one -- put the human pilot in.
Dumb UAVs would be the equivalent of 'human wave' tactic on the ground. So yes, if you can out-manufacture the enemy, you can drown his defenses. But financially, how many dumb UAV equals to one manned fighter? The cost calculus of one dumb UAV vs an F-16 is a misguided one based on this question:
Where do you want the decision maker (pilot) to be, remote or on-scene?
Iran launched more than 300 missiles and attack drones, both from within its borders and from sites in Iraq, Syria and Yemen.
aviationweek.com
F-15Es from the 494th and 335th Fighter Squadrons shot down more than 70 of the drones, along with participation by
Boeing F/A-18 Super Hornets from the USS Dwight D. Eisenhower.
We can be certain that these engagements were mano-a-uav, but the pilots, aided by AWACS, just simply moved from one dumb target to the next. I doubt that there were literally 70 fighters of F-15s and F-18s.