The UAE and Kuwaiti defence ministries released cumulative intercept figures on Wednesday for the first time since the conflict began. The UAE reported 165 ballistic missiles, 2 cruise missiles, and 541 drones intercepted. Kuwait reported 97 ballistic missiles and 283 drones. Combined: 262 ballistic missiles and 824 drones stopped by two countries alone — over 1,088 projectiles in five days of fighting.
These are intercept counts, not launch counts. They exclude every missile and drone that struck its target, every projectile aimed at Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Israel, Oman, Bahrain, or US naval assets, and anything launched but undetected. Iran struck Ras Laffan and Mesaieed in Qatar, shut Ras Tanura in Saudi Arabia, hit Fujairah port, attacked the US consulate in Dubai, struck Duqm in Oman twice, and fired anti-ship ballistic missiles at USS Abraham Lincoln. The aggregate munitions expenditure across all fronts is a substantial multiple of the 1,088 figure disclosed by two Gulf states.
The sustained rate is what matters most for defence planning. The International Institute for Strategic Studies estimated Iran's pre-war Ballistic missile arsenal at approximately 3,000. The Center for Strategic and International Studies published broadly similar assessments. Iran's early shift to constant-rate dispersed launches rather than massed salvos was read as a conservation strategy — spreading fire to extend the campaign's duration. The intercept data through day five shows no visible decline in tempo. Either pre-war estimates of Iran's production capacity and stockpiles were low, or Iran is burning through its inventory at a rate that cannot be sustained for weeks. Both possibilities have consequences that extend well beyond this conflict.
The cost mismatch compounds daily. A Patriot PAC-3 interceptor costs between $4 million and $5.5 million per round, according to US Army procurement data. An Iranian Shahed-136 drone costs an estimated $20,000–$50,000 to produce. If the UAE and Kuwait fired one interceptor per incoming projectile — and many ballistic missiles require two — their combined defensive expenditure exceeds $1 billion in five days. Iran's outlay for the drone component alone is a small fraction of that sum. The defender pays more per intercept than the attacker pays per projectile, and that ratio does not improve with volume.
