As US idles, UK ups its aid to Ukraine with 10,000 extra drones

The UK has announced it will be increasing its previously announced military aid package to Ukraine to include 10,000 additional drones at a total cost of £325 million ($416 million) – support coming at a critical time as Kyiv’s munitions run low amid blocked US assistance.

The UK announced its additional backing of Ukraine’s defensive war on Thursday, saying it would increase previously approved reserves of UAVs. The government said those will include “first-person view (FPV) drones,1,000 one-way attack drones which have been researched and developed in the UK, as well as surveillance and maritime drones.”

The decision augments the UK’s aid package to Ukraine to a total of $416 million, following London’s announcement last month to join allies in a Latvian-led coalition pledging 1 million drones to Kyiv over the next year. 

That effort – which is also backed by Canada, Denmark, Estonia, Germany Lithuania, the Netherlands, and Sweden – was part of London’s previous $256 million assistance commitment.

The increased UK backing comes as Ukraine is running low on munitions, which has inspired renewed Russian assaults in the eastern part of the nation.

That has in part arisen from the absence of aid from the US, as domestic politics take hostage of a planned $60 billion in assistance – partisan legislative warfare President Joe Biden noted in his State of the Union speech Thursday.

“Assistance for Ukraine is being blocked by those who want us to walk away from our leadership in the world,” Biden warned. “History is watching. If the United States walks away now, it will put Ukraine at risk.”

Aware of  that threat – and the unlikelihood of restored US legislative sanity freeing aid up any time soon – the UK stepped up what’s now arguably its leading role of support to Ukraine with the supply of 10,000 additional, sorely needed drones.

“I am ramping up our commitment to arm Ukraine with cutting-edge new drones coming directly from the UK’s world-leading defense industries – straight from the factory floor to the frontline,” said Defence Secretary Grant Shapps, who visited Kyiv in the wake of this week’s sinking of a 300-ton Russian patrol ship in the Black sea by maritime maritime drones. “I encourage international partners to join the UK in this effort. 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.”