President Volodymyr Zelensky stated that Russia would only be capable of launching a 1,000-drone attack on Ukraine if it stockpiles UAVs over several days. In response to such threats, Ukraine is increasingly relying on drone interceptors, he said.
The head of state made these comments during a conversation with journalists.
“They are preparing for production, aiming to be capable of producing 300–350 drones per day. That’s their real situation. They’ve been tasked with reaching 500 per day. I don’t believe they’re there yet. So I don’t take the number 1,000 seriously—though we must understand that if they stockpile for several days, then that kind of attack could indeed happen. We can’t say it won’t,” Zelensky told.
He emphasized that Ukraine is currently focused on finding new ways to counter Russian drones.
“We observe and analyze what’s happening. Right now, we’re shooting down drones with aircraft. We understand how many drones a Mirage or an F-16 can take down in one sortie, and how many of those we can keep in the air at once. We’re also making progress with drone-on-drone interceptors. We’re already using them. The next step is scaling up. We’ve reached the point where we have interceptor technology. This solves the problem we had with the Shaheds, which were being launched at altitudes too high for mobile fire teams to reach. Our answer has been interceptor drones,” the President said.
According to him, one of the issues that will be raised during his visit to Germany is the funding of domestic production of drone interceptors.
“I believe Ukraine must also have 1,000 drones. By the way, we’re already capable of using 100 long-range drones per day — and these are complex systems. This means that the Russians will start to feel the pressure if our partners help us. If we can deploy 300–500 a day, just like the Russians — we’re getting very close to that. So the issue is no longer production capacity. The important thing is that we’ve succeeded. Now the issue is financial,” Zelensky noted.
