Russia’s Garpiya drone series includes long-range attack and export variants. Photo courtesy of the U.S. Army’s ODIN.
Russia builds the Iranian-designed Geran drones it launches nightly at Ukrainian cities using Chinese engines, chips, and raw materials, along with North Korean labor. The supply chain now runs both ways. Russia also ships components and upgraded designs back to Iran for use against U.S. forces.
Growing production has enabled larger attacks. Russia launched almost 6,900 drones at Ukraine in September, including more than 3,600 Shaheds, bringing total Shahed launches since the 2022 invasion to almost 50,000, Commander-in-Chief Oleksandr Syrskyi reported on October 2. The Ukrainian Air Force reported destroying 2,722 Shahed-131/136 drones and 1,935 Shahed-238 jet drones that month. On September 6–7 alone, Russia launched 810 Shahed-type and decoy drones.
The attacks also exploit a cost imbalance. Open-source estimates put a Geran-2 at $20,000 to $50,000, compared with a historical average of about $4 million for a Patriot PAC-3 MSE interceptor. In May, the U.S. Army sought proposals for a Patriot interceptor costing less than $1 million to improve the economics of defending against drones and other threats. twz.com
Iran initially supplied Russia with complete Shahed drones and components, then helped establish domestic production through Sahara Thunder’s procurement network. In late 2022, Russian executives agreed to pay Iran $1.7 billion, partly in gold bars, to establish the Alabuga drone plant in Tatarstan. Russia’s push to produce 1,000 drones daily relies heavily on Iranian technical assistance. Annual capacity is estimated at more than 36,000 Gerans, while a planned carbon-fiber expansion at Alabuga could add about 28,000 airframes annually.
Chinese companies supply engines, microchips, and other Shahed components to Iran and Russia in disregard of U.S. sanctions. Xiamen Victory Technology sells Limbach L550 engines used in the Shahed-136. Conflict Armament Research documented a “discernible increase” in Chinese-made Shahed components, while Chinese customs data show hundreds of containers of dual-use goods, including engines, chips, fiber-optic cable and gyroscopes, shipped to Russia and Iran.
Chinese technology also powers Russia’s newest models. The Geran-4 jet drone, used in combat since May 2026, runs on a Chinese Telefly TF-TJ2000A turbojet. A Chinese state company also supplied Rosatom with raw materials for Geran airframes.
Western components reach these factories through China. A Treasury investigation found that nearly all American and European parts in these drones passed through authorized distributors to retailers in mainland China or Hong Kong, then to Iran or Russia. Payments typically went through Hong Kong shell companies.
On May 8, Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control sanctioned 10 individuals and companies across the Middle East, Asia and Eastern Europe for helping Iran’s military obtain weapons and materials for Shahed drones and ballistic missiles. Targets included China-based Yushita Shanghai International Trade Co., which facilitated purchases for Iran’s technology acquisition center, and Iran-based Pishgam Electronic Safeh Company, which procured thousands of servomotors of the type recovered in downed Shahed-136 drones, according to Treasury.
Alabuga also relies on foreign recruits to staff its assembly lines. The Alabuga Start program recruited women aged 18 to 22 from Uganda, Kenya, Rwanda, Nigeria and other countries with promises of work-study opportunities, a 2024 AP investigation found. About 90 percent of the foreign women recruited through the program worked on drones, according to David Albright, an expert cited by AP. Workers described long hours, surveillance, lower pay than promised and exposure to harmful chemicals.
North Korea supplies additional labor. As many as 25,000 North Koreans work at the Alabuga drone plant, according to the Multilateral Sanctions Monitoring Team’s September 16 report. Pyongyang has promoted sending workers to Alabuga’s Geran-2 production lines since 2025. Released with a joint statement by the team’s 11 member states, the report estimates that 35,600 to 101,280 North Koreans work abroad, nearly all in China and Russia, including 15,000 to 30,000 in Russia at the end of 2025.
Russia disguises the workers as students to circumvent the UN ban on North Korean labor abroad. Of more than 36,400 visas it issued to North Koreans in 2025, 35,800, or about 98 percent, were student visas. Each worker in Russia earns an average of about $7,500 annually, with wages up to five times higher than in China. Pyongyang confiscates 80 to 90 percent of those wages. The overseas labor program generated an estimated $450 million to $800 million in 2025, helping fund North Korea’s nuclear and missile programs.
The arrangement could also strengthen North Korea’s drone program. A separate Ukrainian military intelligence estimate cited by Victor Cha of the Center for Strategic and International Studies and Joseph Kim of the Bush Institute put the number assigned to Alabuga at up to 12,000. The authors warned that returning technicians could bring valuable mass-production experience.
During the Iran war, Russia has shipped drone components, ammunition, and TNT to Iran across the Caspian Sea. Iran has used Russian-enhanced Shaheds and Russian targeting intelligence against U.S. forces, according to U.S. intelligence officials.
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