The North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) has announced plans to give Ukraine one million drones in 2024.
Kyiv being given the drones for its war effort was the center of a Feb. 15 meeting of NATO defense ministers in Brussels, according to the Warzone. The ministers gathered in the Belgian capital to discuss defense investments and present a consolidated front for the alliance. Two NATO member nations, the U.K. and Latvia, will be responsible for the endeavor.
"A group of allies is coming together with the goal of delivering one million drones to Ukraine," said NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg. "Our commitment is essential to preserving Ukraine's freedom," he continued, stressing that NATO allies account for 99 percent of all military aid to Kyiv.
British Defense Secretary Grant Shapps confirmed the news in a statement, saying that both London and Riga "will co-lead an international coalition to build Ukraine’s vital drone capabilities." He added: "Together, we will give Ukraine the capabilities it needs to defend itself and win this war, [and] to ensure that [Russian President Vladimir] Putin fails in his illegal and barbaric ambitions."
Latvian Defense Minister Andris Spruds also confirmed the development, stating that the two nations will work with Ukrainian Defense Minister Rustem Umerov toward this goal. "Together with other members of the drone coalition, we have formed a strong core," Spruds continued.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky signed a decree in early February establishing the Unmanned Systems Forces (USF), a new branch under the Ukrainian Armed Forces specifically dedicated to drones. According to Kyiv Independent, the USF "will reportedly focus specifically on improving Ukraine's work with drones" by "creating special drone-specific units, ramping up training, [systematizing] their use, increasing production, and pushing innovation. (Related: Drone use is widening in Ukraine, bringing with it potential dawn of robotic killing machines.)
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Drones playing a huge role in the Ukraine conflict
Before the establishment of the USF, Zelensky said in January that one of Kyiv's main goals for 2024 was to outpace Russia in the production of drones. "To address that imbalance, Ukraine had already said that it aimed to produce one million drones domestically in 2024," the Warzone pointed out.
"It is by now no secret that drones are playing a vitally important role in the war, for both sides and across all domains. As well as repeatedly emphasizing the importance of drones to its operations, Ukrainian officials have also warned that Russia possesses far greater numbers of these systems than it does – with a notable disparity when it comes to the widely-used first person view types."
Mykhailo Fedorov, Ukraine's deputy prime minister for innovation, confirmed Kyiv's plan to produce more drones domestically. He told Reuters that there are plans to produce "thousands of long-range drones capable of deep strikes into Russia." Ten companies have stepped up to the challenge, Fedorov added.
"We need to act in an anti-bureaucratic way. This is the essence of a breakthrough in the war of technology. We are going to continue to put our bets on this, to work in this direction – because technology can really save us," he said, citing examples of how Kyiv removed bureaucratic roadblocks to drone development and production.
"We removed taxes on UAV (unmanned aerial vehicle) components, simplified the contracting procedure, and the procedure for decommissioning. In other words, we took all the blockages that private sector companies were facing and addressed them in six months by passing all the necessary laws and resolutions."
The Ukrainian innovation minister also mentioned that efforts are underway to localize the production of drone components. As of writing, Ukraine's drone industry relies heavily on components sourced from foreign nations – including China, an ally of Moscow. "That's why I think that if we continue this trend, by the end of the year – we will have a lot of companies that have already made more than 50 percent of their components locally," said Fedorov.
Visit UkraineWitness.com for more stories about Ukraine's use of drones against Russia.
Watch Patrick Lancaster talk about Russia's use of energy weapons to take out Ukrainian drones.
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