Do you know what the India deal includes?
The Because of Reaper’s nature, unit-cost estimates can be tricky. Various media reports cite a per-unit cost from $4 million to $5 million. They are quite incorrect. Because they are integral to Reaper’s ability to operate, the ground components for it must be included, and a Combat Air Patrol, or “CAP” (i.e. the specified Reaper operating unit), consists of four air vehicles, not one. Reaper unit cost is well above that of the aircraft frequently compared to it: the A-10. Around 20 million US dollars. The Reaper is not cheaper to buy than aircraft it is compared to; it is multiples more expensive: from two to six times more costly.
The because each Reaper flies a large number of hours in the air, the math suppresses the per-hour Reaper number. If the calculation is for total maintenance costs over the course of a year for a Reaper unit, the relationship changes: at a per year cost of $5.1 million, per individual Reaper, and at $20.4 million per CAP, the Reaper shows itself to be well above the cost to maintain and operate over a year for an individual aircraft's.
The Reaper’s infrastructure necessitates at least 171 personnel for each CAP: these include 43 mission control personnel, including seven pilots and seven sensor operators, 59 launch, recovery and maintenance personnel (including six more pilots and sensor operators), 66 Processing Exploitation Dissemination personnel for intelligence and its support (including 14 more maintenance personnel) and three “other equipment” personnel.
