The war in Ukraine changed how military strategists think about drones more fundamentally than any conflict since the United States began using armed unmanned aerial vehicles systematically in Afghanistan and Iraq after 2001. What Ukraine demonstrated — in real time, on European soil — is that relatively cheap commercial-derived drone technology can neutralise armoured vehicles, strike supply lines, conduct reconnaissance at tactical and operational depth, and provide a persistent surveillance capability that fundamentally alters the military relationship between attacker and defender. European militaries have drawn lessons from this laboratory with urgent attention. The drone race is on — and Europe is competing from a mixed starting position.
What Ukraine proved
Dr. Fabian Hoffmann, research fellow at the University of Oslo’s Centre for Research on Extremism and a specialist in unmanned systems, describes the Ukrainian experience as “the most important real-world test of drone technology in combined arms warfare.” His analysis identifies several key findings: “First, numbers matter enormously. Drone warfare is partly an attrition contest — both sides lose drones at rates that require industrial-scale production or supply to sustain. Second, the ability to adapt quickly — to change electronic countermeasures, alter flight patterns, develop new capabilities on short cycles — is as important as the initial capability. Third, the asymmetric economic logic is powerful: a €500 commercial drone can destroy a €3 million armoured vehicle, and no adversary can price itself out of that equation by building more expensive targets.”
The implications for European militaries are direct. As examined in our air defence assessment, the challenge of countering drone threats has driven investment in directed energy weapons, high-powered microwave systems and AI-enabled fire control. The offensive side of the equation is generating equally significant investment.
Where European countries are investing
Poland has moved fastest among EU member states, signing contracts for loitering munitions (single-use attack drones) from both Israeli and domestic suppliers, and investing in drone swarm technology through the Polish armaments group PGZ. The Polish approach reflects the strategic logic examined in our Polish defence analysis: building layered, rapidly deployable capabilities for territorial defence that can function even if supply lines from Western Europe are disrupted.
France’s aerospace industry — MBDA, Dassault, Thales — has significant capacity for high-end military UAVs, including the Eurodrone programme being developed jointly with Germany, Italy and Spain. The Eurodrone is a medium-altitude long-endurance (MALE) platform optimised for intelligence-surveillance-reconnaissance missions rather than strike — a choice that reflects EU legal constraints on offensive weapons procurement, and is being debated in the context of the EU common defence discussion.
The industrial gap
Hoffmann is cautious about European progress. “The challenge is not building one excellent drone — European industry can do that. The challenge is building hundreds of thousands of cheaper drones, with fast iteration cycles, at the cost structures that modern drone warfare requires. That kind of production capacity has not historically been how European defence contractors operate, and building it takes time.” The European rearmament spending is providing the budget — the question is whether the industrial culture and procurement processes can adapt quickly enough to translate money into the right kind of capability.
