The UK Ministry of Defence (MoD) announced on 7 March 2024 that the UK is to provide Ukraine with a complete package of GBP 325 million (EUR 382 million) for cutting-edge unmanned systems to help fight the Russian invasion.
The investment is a significant boosting of the GBP 200 million unmanned system package announced by UK Prime Minister Rishi Sunak in January 2024 and will allow the delivery of over 10,000 unmanned systems to Ukraine. Most of these will be first-person-view (FPV) unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs), although there will also be 1,000 UK-developed loitering munitions as well as surveillance and maritime UAVs.
The 7 March announcement was made by UK Defence Secretary Grant Shapps during his third visit to Ukraine. Accompanied by UK Chief of the Defence Staff Admiral Sir Tony Radakin, Shapps met Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and Defence Minister Rustem Umerov and reiterated the UK’s commitment to supporting Ukraine.
“I am ramping up our commitment to arm Ukraine with cutting-edge new drones coming directly from the UK’s world-leading defence industries – straight from the factory floor to the frontline. I encourage international partners to join the UK in this effort,” Shapps was quoted as saying in a UK MoD press release.
Ukraine’s armed forces are using UK-donated weapons to unprecedented effect, to help lay waste to nearly 30% of Russia’s Black Sea Fleet,” Shapps added. “On my third visit to this great country I was pleased to be able to offer my firm reassurance to President Zelenskyy on the UK’s unwavering commitment to the brave people and military forces of Ukraine.”
The Ukrainian armed forces have made highly effective use of various types of unmanned platforms, destroying and damaging thousands of pieces of Russian equipment and vehicles using much cheaper systems. Highly manoeuvrable FPV UAVs, which allow the operator to finely control the movements of the UAV in real time, have been successfully used to bypass Russian air defences to hit their targets.
In the Black Sea Ukraine’s own Magura V5 bomb-laden unmanned surface vessels have been used to sink several vessels of the Russian Black Sea Fleet.
The UK MoD noted that more than GBP 100 million of its announced package would be spent on maritime capabilities, allowing Ukraine to “continue to turn the tide in the Black Sea”.
Following a meeting of the US-led Ukraine Defence Contact Group in February, which convenes more than 50 countries in providing military support to Ukraine, Shapps announced that the UK would join Latvia in leading an international capability coalition to bolster Ukraine’s UAV capabilities.
