Ukraine's capacity to produce drones similar to the Iranian-designed Shahed "are no longer inferior to Russia's," Strategic Industries Minister Oleksandr Kamyshin said in an interview aired on Feb. 26.
Ukraine has intensified its efforts to ramp up domestic production of attack drones, a critical tool on the battlefield, aiming to manufacture one million drones this year.
Russia has used Shahed-type kamikaze drones, both supplied by Iran and domestically produced, to attack Ukraine since the start of its full-scale invasion in February 2022.
The Ukrainian version of the Shahed drone is identical to the original "in terms of the amount of explosives they carry, their range, and other technical parameters," Kamyshin said on national television.
Since autumn 2022, Russia has regularly attacked Ukrainian cities and infrastructure with thousands of Shahed-type drones, initially delivered from Iran but now produced domestically in new factories.
Ukraine's capabilities for 2024 are six times higher than they were last year, and the country's defense industry also produced three times more in 2023 than it did in 2022, Kamyshin said at a forum in Kyiv on Feb. 25.
Kateryna Hodunova
Over 90% of the drones currently being used on the front line in Ukraine are Ukrainian-made, according to Digital Transformations Minister Mykhailo Fedorov.
Ukraine is also working on establishing the mass production of attack drones similar to Russian Lancet drones with a range of 40 kilometers, Fedorov said on Feb. 7.
President Volodymyr Zelensky signed a decree earlier in February creating a separate branch of Ukraine's Armed Forces dedicated to drones.
The Unmanned Systems Forces will focus on improving Ukraine's work with drones, creating special drone-specific units, ramping up training, systemizing their use, increasing production, and pushing innovation.
Francis Farrell
