I think my main issue with this entire exercise is that "death drones" and "stealth drones" are already built in some unknown numbers, and that their roles in the military are seemingly well understood.

Unmanned Predator drones shoot Hellfire missiles at targets.

Stealth RQ-170 Drones stalk the enemy and obtain intelligence without tipping off the enemy.

Maybe other drones exist (maybe so stealthy that their existence is still unknown to the public), but we already know of these two strategies from public reports in Afghanistan / Iraq.

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We also have models for what we expect the next 10 years or 20 years of (potential) war to look like. A likely scenario is that China / Taiwan relations sour dramatically, and China decides to attack Taiwan for some reason, and the US rushes to Taiwan's aid.

Under such a scenario, the USA would be armed with whatever our Carrier Strike Groups can carry (CIWS, Cruise Missiles, a myriad of supporting destroyers and submarines, multiple air-wings, etc. etc.). While China would be armed with its huge Air Force, its increasingly huge Navy (of mostly small ships, but a few smaller carriers are on the way), and most worryingly: China's high production output can build huge numbers of cruise missiles.

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There's probably a few other locations in the world where USA vs Russia could get into a ground conflict. But... lets take the China vs Taiwan scenario for a sec and think.

Where does drone warfare fit? Stealth Drones for detecting enemy movements would be key: both for US and China. Carriers are fast and expensive: China absolutely would want to neutralize them. But how does China find a group of sea-vessels traveling at 40-knots in the first place?

And that's assuming that those drones aren't shot out of the air by anti-air defenses.

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Maybe the detection problem is solved, and now China is ready to fire upon a US Strike Group (not necessarily at the carrier, but maybe at its anti-air destroyers / cruisers in preparation for future strikes).

It seems like the obvious weapon of choice would be China's hypersonic cruise missiles: traveling at Mach 5 and with coordinated swarming AI, its the obvious way to avoid CIWS / CRAM / Patriot missile defenses.

Once the anti-air defenses are down, China can continue its attack with cheaper subsonic missiles to defeat the rest of the fleet. No drones required, aside from maybe the initial recon missions.

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As far as people can tell: it seems like it will be a game of cat-and-mouse. If the US Carrier Strike group can avoid detection, the US would win the combat.

But if the US Carrier Strike group is detected: then its all over. China has more than enough cruise missiles to win.

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I'm not seeing how, or where, a swarm of cheap electric-motor autonomous quadcopters comes into this playbook. That's bad for stealth / recon, because the enemy knows you're watching them. (AKA: The Aircraft Carrier will just launch an F-22 and shoot down the swarm, blinding the would-be intelligence). To be successful at its recon mission, the drones have to secretly watch and pinpoint the carrier strike group, or survive a dedicated attack from the Aircraft Carrier's myriad of squadrons at its disposal.

If we're already past the detection phase for some reason, then there's no need to use drones. I think the expectation is that China's Mach 5+ hypersonic cruise missiles will instant-win the combat. Those move too fast to be shot down reliably. (Patriot missiles only fly at Mach 4)