The United Kingdom and Ukraine have agreed to launch joint defense projects, including the production of interceptor drones and glide bombs, British Minister for Defense Preparedness and Industry Luke Pollard said during the Defense Industry Forum in Kyiv, Bloomberg reports.
The production of drones to intercept enemy strike drones, such as the Shahed, will be launched as part of the Octopus project. According to Luke Pollard, production will initially be organized in the UK. It is expected that in the first stages it will be possible to reach a volume of about 2 thousand drones per month, and all this resource will be transferred to Ukraine to combat Russian drones.
The minister emphasized that the production process will be organized flexibly in order to quickly respond to changes on the battlefield.
"UK is outstanding at R&D and advanced manufacture, so we can add something that our Ukrainian friends don’t have in this respect. We need to be fast and we need to be first," said Luke Pollard.
One of Ukraine's priorities is the development of interceptor drones, which are capable of automatically targeting and destroying the target before reaching the object. The Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, Oleksandr Syrskyy, reported last week that in September Russia launched almost 6.9 thousand drones over Ukraine, more than half of which were Shaheds. Most of the enemy drones, according to him, were destroyed by interceptors.
In addition to drones, the UK plans to launch another joint project with Ukraine - the production of glide bombs. According to Pollard, cooperation in this area will allow creating technologies necessary to deter Russia and strengthen Europe's defense capabilities.
"We’re starting with drones for obvious reasons, but in general Ukraine is an essential partner for us in terms of creating the technologies we need to deter Russia and to re-arm Europe," said Luke Pollard.
In June of this year, we wrote that Ukraine had tested a domestically developed guided aerial bomb. According to preliminary data, the bomb is capable of hitting targets at a distance of up to 60 kilometers. In addition, work is underway on solutions that will increase its range to 80 km.