In 2023, a year into Russia’s unprecedented invasion of Ukraine, Kyiv was producing around 800,000 drones a year. By 2024, that number had more than doubled to two million. Fast forward to last month – when President Volodymyr Zelensky announced that the country was now churning out more than 10 million units annually with plans to double that number to 20 million by this time next year.
The rapid rate and intensity of production is having an impact. Just this week, Russian president Vladimir Putin was forced to acknowledge that attacks on the country’s refineries and energy infrastructure were having an effect. However, he added: “But they certainly cause us harm, that is obvious, and we understand, see and know this.” The rare admission was a glimpse into life on the ground where exhausted Russians are queuing for fuel and complaining about skyrocketing costs.
Since the beginning of the war, Ukraine has found itself serving as a laboratory for the use of drones on the battlefield. As relatively cheaper weapons, they serve as a major low-cost force multiplier against Russia, with its vast stockpiles of cruise and hypersonic missiles. It understood the strategic potential of the weapons the hard way - by being attacked by swarms of Iranian-style Shahed drones by Russia.
According to AFP, Russia fired 6,297 long-range drones into Ukraine last month, 14 times more than in the same month last year. On 9 July alone, a record-breaking 741 drones and decoys were entered into western Ukraine, more than the entire month of July in 2025 when 423 drones were fired into the territory. Now, it is trying to play the country at its own game.
On Tuesday, Russia’s Moscow region was hit by almost 800 Ukrainian drones only two days after a similar attack, officials said. It marked one of the largest drone attacks by Ukraine since the war broke out in 2022. At least 10 people were killed in the onslaught.
That came shortly after a devastating attack on Russia’s Amazon-style Wildberries facilities. A day later it was reported that a jet-powered Shahed drone flew nearly 900km from Crimea into western Ukraine in one of the deepest strikes of its kind so far. Ukraine, likewise, is catching up with distance as well as number of attacks.
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