Iran has an assessed stock of something like 80,000 Shaheds. And you can put them anywhere and everywhere.
Shutting down production of a weapon like Shahed is very difficult because they're simple, cheap, and can be built without a lot of infrastructure.
They can keep building them, dispersed, and keep launching them, from anywhere, and every time they do that they've spent $50,000 at most and the US has spent a million minimum to intercept. That's the economic disparity problem the US is now fighting. It's not about the capabilities of the weapons, it's about the cost of the weapons.
Air superiority is not going to help as much as you think it is, when you're fighting an enemy who is able to attack you with weapons it builds in sheds and garages and forces you to spend a massive amount of money to stop every attack.
Where did you see an estimate of 80K Shahed-class attack UAVs? Numbers I'm familiar with are 20K-30K before the start of the current war.
Granted, that's still a large number.
Also, they're made in pretty large factories on assembly lines (that's why max output was estimated to be 10K/month, assuming all components were available).
Guess what infrastructure the IAF hit first the first day of the war?
The economics are of course important, and interception costs vary widely -- but attack UAVs are not typically brought down by Patriots or THAAD or Arrow 2/3 systems -- those are focused on the ballistic missiles (Mach 8 underway, not the 185 km/h Shahed) .
In fact, while I don't know the US costs, over here the cost of an Iron Dome interceptor is $30-40K, and that's the usual method. If aircraft are used (far less common), an F-16 flight hour costs $8000 here (including manpower, maintenance and depreciation), and the AIM-9 missile used ~$400K.
(If it can be intercepted by Laser Dome, cost is ~$5).
Sure, long term it's an issue -- but there's no reason to think it'll matter long term. IRGC personnel are already deserting launch sites and refusing launch orders simply because it's become too dangerous to be near one.
