The Socom notification is a big deal for the drone industry, said Phil Finnegan, director of corporate analysis for the Teal Group, an aerospace defense consulting firm. "From the industry perspective this is important, because there are very few programs out there," said Finnegan. "Companies are eager not just to get the business, but to get a blue chip customer like Socom."

"The Global Hawk is becoming the backbone of high-altitude long endurance surveillance in the US military. The fleet is growing very rapidly," said Philip Finnegan, director of corporate analysis at the Teal Group, which specializes in the aerospace market.

Pentagon contractors have been responding to the pullback in U.S. military budgets by shifting focus to international markets, said Philip Finnegan, director of corporate analysis at Teal Group, a Fairfax, Virginia-based consultant that tracks defense and aerospace companies.

Even with revenue at Lockheed, Raytheon, General Dynamics and Falls Church, Virginia-based Northrop down 4 percent since 2011, non-U.S. sales have climbed 9 percent during that stretch. The four companies also have pared expenses, including reducing their combined workforce since 2011 by 23,000 people, or about 6 percent, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.

The improvements to profitability, combined with investor-friendly moves such as stock buybacks, may influence share prices more than the strife in Iraq and Syria, Finnegan said.

"Clearly the world has become increasingly unstable. The question of whether that has a major impact on the defense budget is uncertain," Finnegan said. "There may be an investor psychology that suggests that there's going to be a large benefit to these companies. But the jury is still out."

Phil Finnegan, an aviation analyst with the Teal Group, said while the U.S. has led the world in developing the technology behind drones, it's fallen far behind when it comes to letting them fly legally.

"Countries like Canada, Australia, the United Kingdom — a lot of European countries — are going after this market," he says.

It'll take the FAA several years to finalize regulations for all drones, Finnegan says, but he believes this initial move will make the American motion picture industry more competitive on the world stage.

"As the prospects for growth have decreased in the defense industry, the way that defense companies can attract investors is by showing that they can increase profit margins," Philip Finnegan, director of corporate analysis at the Teal Group, an aerospace and defense market research firm, told Politico. "There's been a drive in the defense industry to increase profit margins and return more to shareholders."