Ukraine Races to Develop Its Own Long-range Weapons to Counter Russia

The Washington Post / David L. Stern

13:58 JST, December 12, 2024

KYIV – As Ukrainian officials brace for what could be severe cutbacks in Western military aid next year, they are scrambling to ramp up their own arms production, especially for weapons systems that can strike deep into Russian territory to replace those supplied by Western governments.

At the heart of the Ukrainian domestic defense production is the country’s program for long-range attack drones, which regularly strike targets hundreds of miles from the Russia-Ukraine border to disrupt Moscow’s war effort, Ukrainian officials said.

Drones have the advantage of being easily and quickly produced, but analysts warn they are only a partial solution to Ukraine’s numerous battlefield challenges.

“In the long term, what Ukraine would like to do is to have two fists,” said Konrad Muzyka, director of the Poland-based Rochan defense consultancy. “One fist is going to be fully developed capability to deliver strike packages via drones, and the second capability would be short-range cruise and ballistic missiles or even medium range.”

Three weeks ago, Russia shocked the world by launching a nuclear-capable intermediate-range ballistic missile at the Ukrainian city of Dnipro after Ukraine fired shorter-range U.S.-supplied missiles at targets inside Russia. It was seen as a warning to Ukraine and the West about Moscow’s readiness to use its nuclear-armed missile arsenal.

Hours later, in a strike that drew less attention, Ukrainian drones hit the Kapustin Yar base near the Caspian Sea, from where the Russian missile was fired, according to Ukrainian officials. Russian officials confirmed a drone attack in the area.

It is not clear how much damage there was, but it showed Ukrainian capacity to quickly strike back at a target more than 400 miles away – much farther than the range of any U.S.-supplied munitions.

The drone attacks have become a regular occurrence. In recent months, Ukrainian officials have announced every few days a new strike on facilities critical to Moscow’s war effort: ammunition stores, airfields, logistics hubs, oil depots and petroleum refineries.

The amount of damage that the drones have inflicted – and the extent to which Russia has been forced to alter its battlefield strategy – is hard to verify. Still, Ukrainian and Western officials say there has been some effect on Russian forces.

On Friday, as Ukrainians celebrated Armed Forces Day, President Volodymyr Zelensky posted on Telegram a video of the latest long distance attack drone, Peklo – or “Hell” – the first consignment of which had been delivered to the country’s military, he said.

The drone, which includes elements of a missile, flies at more than 400 mph and at a distance of over 400 miles, Ukrainian Strategic Industries Minister Herman Smetanin wrote in a separate post.

“The Ukrainian manufacturer created the missile-drone from scratch in record time – within a year,” he wrote. “The product already has successful combat applications.”

In a Facebook post on Thursday, Defense Minister Rustem Umerov said Ukraine would next year deliver “over 30,000 DeepStrike drones,” a “next-generation” weapon that “can operate autonomously over long distances and strike enemy targets with high precision.”

“We are showing the world that Ukraine is capable of innovation and technological independence,” Umerov wrote.

Most defense analysts agree, however, that drones on their own will not be enough. “Everyone’s got a drone toy. They need missiles that go boom. They need things that are going to deliver a warhead deep inside Russia,” said a Western arms industry specialist who travels to Ukraine regularly and spoke on the condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the issue.

Ukrainian officials are fast-tracking their cruise and ballistic missile programs, and in August, Zelensky said the country had tested its first ballistic missile. Last month, he said Ukraine had produced 100 missiles this year, but he did not specify what kind.

Last week, Umerov said Ukraine had begun large-scale production of two of its own weapons systems: the Palianytsia – a long-range hybrid of a drone and missile that uses a jet engine – and the Neptune cruise missile.

Both weapons have been used in limited quantities. In 2022, a Neptune destroyed the flagship of the Russian Black Sea fleet, the Moskva. In August, Zelensky posted on X a video of what he said was the first combat use of the Palianytsia.

The defense industry is set to expand even further in the coming months and possibly years. Ukrainian officials say developing their own arms industry is key for the country’s long-term security – and even its continued existence.

“We have to be armed, prepared for any scenario, having this aggressive neighbor,” said Yehor Cherniev, chairman of the Ukrainian delegation to the NATO Parliamentary Assembly. “That’s why we understand that we have to have a strong army with all kind of weapons.”

For the moment, though, Ukraine’s Western allies are providing the overwhelming bulk of missiles. Kyiv is hopeful that it can persuade President-elect Donald Trump to continue the U.S. backing of Ukraine’s battle against Russia’s invading forces, now approaching its third year.

A delegation of Ukrainian officials, led by head of the presidential administration, Andriy Yermak, flew to the United States last week to meet with top officials in the Trump camp, Ukrainian officials said.

“Both in terms of value and in terms of bulk, there are a large number of critical munitions and systems which at the moment the United States is the only really credible source,” said Justin Bronk, an air warfare expert and senior research fellow at the Royal United Services Institute in London.

But given Trump’s promise to end the war “in 24 hours” after becoming president, there is a possibility that he will cut off aid to Ukraine in an effort to force Zelensky to the negotiating table with Russian President Vladimir Putin. Vice President-elect JD Vance and Trump confidant Elon Musk have also spoken out against continued U.S. aid to Ukraine.

Europe, which is experiencing its own armament shortages, could find it difficult to make up the difference. Countries including Hungary and Slovakia are also pushing to bring the war to a quick end, while Moscow-friendly Calin Georgescu is the front-runner to win Romania’s presidential elections.

That’s all the more reason to develop Ukraine’s domestic arms industry with not a moment to lose, analysts say. Ukraine needs “to decrease the dependency” on Western arms “below what it is now and do it quickly,” said the arms industry specialist.

Western governments initially resisted providing money directly to Ukraine’s arms industry, which at the beginning of the war produced close to nothing. But this year, led by Denmark, the funds began to flow.

The European Union recently agreed to provide some $440 million to Ukraine’s defense production, taken from windfall profits of Russian assets that have been frozen in the West. Lithuania, Norway, the Netherlands and Sweden have also contributed funds, which pay for weapons that the Ukrainian government has prioritized.

In October, Zelensky said the United States would give Ukraine some $800 million to develop long-distance drones, with more money to come later to finance other long-range weapon systems.

But that money covers only a small portion of Ukraine’s armament requirements. Western military aid is in the tens of billions. Meanwhile, Ukrainian officials say their arms industry could produce $10 billion to $20 billion worth of weapons per year, though at the moment, some $4 billion has been invested.

Ukraine has produced close to 2 million drones this year – the majority of which were first-person view, or FPV – and could produce another 2 million if there is funding for them, Cherniev said.

However, a fleet of long-range attack drones, no matter how large, cannot resolve the challenges Ukraine is facing on the battlefield, where Russian forces have captured territory in recent weeks at the fastest pace since the beginning of the war.

“If we are talking about problems on the front line, then certainly drones are not the solution to the problem – because the solution to the problem is a lack of manpower, lack of training, problems in command and control, and so on and so forth,” said Muzyka, the defense analyst.