Recent conflicts in the world have shown that drones are effective, terrifyingly so. Militaries have been using drones and UAVs for years now, but we are now at the point where we get high definition drone strike footage on social media.
But recent times have shown that drones are disproportionately effective. Cost, psychological impact, and instant helmet-cam footage all favour the attacker. They cause most of the equipment losses and a growing share of strategic damage on both sides, (even though most individual drones are shot down or jammed).
The result is a perpetual arms race: whichever side fields the next cheap, hard-to-stop drone first wins a temporary but often decisive edge.
Today, anti-missile batteries are common-place. The real question now is, how soon anti-drone systems will become just as ubiquitous.