Ukraine appears to be beating Russia in the drone production race

Ukraine has set ambitious production goals, especially for the decidedly valuable FPV drones, but officials say it will exceed them. Kyiv has also built up an arsenal of homemade naval drones, which it has used to wreak havoc on Moscow’s Black Sea Fleet, and long-range attack drones, which it uses to strike key military and energy facilities deep inside Russia.

Ukraine’s increased drone output has come amid broader efforts to scale up its defense-industrial base. Kyiv went from almost no weapons production before the war to producing new munitions at lightning speed.

“While years ago, the Ukrainian defense industry unfortunately looked helpless, today it is an industry that is on its way to leadership, at least in Europe,” Zelenskyy said Tuesday. “Today, these are industries that Ukraine can once again be rightfully proud of.”

Conflict analysts at the Institute for the Study of War, a think tank that has been closely following the war in Ukraine, said this week that Kyiv’s ongoing efforts to grow its domestic military production would eventually allow the country to reduce its reliance on Western military support.

But, the analysts wrote in a Wednesday assessment, Kyiv “still requires considerable Western assistance for the next several years in order to defend against Russian aggression and liberate strategically vital areas that Russian forces currently occupy.”

Western countries have provided well over $100 billion in military and security aid for Ukraine. The US is the single biggest supplier of weaponry, having provided nearly $60 billion worth of security assistance since the start of the war.