Swarm welcome: Britain lines up 120,000 drones for Ukraine
Giant UAV package will include strike, recon, logistics, and maritime systems
The UK government says it will deliver at least 120,000 drones to Ukraine this year to help it fight against Russia.
This latest support package will include thousands of long-range strike drones, intelligence and reconnaissance units, logistics drones and maritime capabilities, according to the Ministry of Defence (MoD).
It is backed by a wider £3 billion from the UK in military support for Ukraine this year, as well as funding from the G7-led Extraordinary Revenue Acceleration (ERA) loan scheme.
Accompanying the drones will be hundreds of thousands of artillery rounds, plus thousands of surface-to-air missiles, Defence Secretary John Healey said. Deliveries of the new kit have already begun.
The majority of the investment in uncrewed systems will go to UK-based companies, including Tekever, Windracers, and Malloy Aeronautics. Windracers developed the HCMC twin-engine cargo drone, which was the the first such vehicle to land on a Royal Navy aircraft carrier in 2023.
Sending British-made drones to Ukraine may seem redundant in light of the country's hard-won pre-eminence in battlefield drone technology, but the MoD claims that the UK sector is rapidly advancing, and this effort supports both British security and broader European deterrence.
"This big boost of battle-proven drones will give Ukrainian forces the capability they need to defend their people and fight back against Russian aggression," Healey commented.
The latest announcement builds on an earlier £500 million air defence package announced in February, which led to the rapid delivery of air defence interceptors, alongside more than 1,000 Lightweight Multirole Missiles (LMM) manufactured in Belfast, Northern Ireland.
Otherwise known as Martlet, the LMM is a laser-guided weapon designed to engage aerial drones and fast attack boats at a range of over 6 km (4 miles). It equips the Royal Navy's Wildcat helicopters and is also currently deployed as Ground Based Air Defence (GBAD) against drone attacks at RAF Akrotiri in Cyprus. ®