In his nightly address on Monday, President Volodymyr Zelensky said that he has been working with the country’s drone and missile manufacturers to ensure the maximum production of long-range weapons.
The announcement comes as drone production in Ukraine is already soaring, according to reports, and foreign partners have promised more drones, aircraft, and missiles.
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“The key issue is production volumes,” Zelensky said of domestic manufacturing.
“The Ministry of Defense and other government officials, our defense and security forces, and all the main companies that produce Ukrainian drones and missiles were in the discussion today,” he said, adding he has also had talks with government officials responsible for the financing side of weapons production.
These collaborations work best “when everyone is in the same conversation, when all those involved in preparing important decisions who are actually affected can bring real information to the table and cannot lie,” Zelensky said, noting that there were differing assessments of domestic production potential and companies’ real capacities.
Immediately preceding Zelensky’s talks with domestic producers, however, both European members have pledged, and US leaders have hinted at promising to deliver more long-range weapons from drones to Tomahawk missiles and Gripen fighter planes.
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Germany will initiate a $351 million program to supply Ukraine with several thousand long-range drones for deep strikes against Russian military targets, Berlin’s Defense Minister Boris Pistorius announced earlier this month.
On Sunday, US Vice President JD Vance confirmed that the administration is reviewing Zelensky’s request, which popped up at a recent meeting with President Donald Trump on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly in New York, to facilitate the transfer of long-range Tomahawk cruise missiles to Ukraine.
The potential delivery of the potent weapon system – which has a formidable range of up to 2,500 km (1,550 miles) – is seen as a direct response to what the White House calls Russian leader Vladimir Putin’s refusal to engage seriously in peace talks.
Meanwhile, the transfer of Saab JAS 39 Gripens – light, single-engine supersonic multirole fighters – from Sweden to Ukraine has been in discussion since at least September 2024. Kyiv initially turned down the proposal in July 2024 due to concerns about the feasibility of bedding down two different, complex aircraft systems simultaneously. At that time, Ukraine was entirely focused on implementing its F-16 program.
On Monday, however, First Deputy Defense Minister Lt. Gen. Ivan Havrylyuk confirmed that the Gripen is among the warplanes Kyiv will receive when asked by a BBC reporter.
Remarkably, it was reported in June that Ukraine’s drone production has increased by 900 percent over the previous 12 months, with monthly UAV output reportedly jumping from 20,000 in summer 2024 to more than 200,000 units.
Zelensky repeated his concerns that even those boosted numbers will not be enough to keep up with Russia’s mounting supply of drones and increasing aerial attacks.
“We must produce the maximum, and our Ukrainian production capacity is still far from being filled,” he said.
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