How Europe hopes to turn Ukraine into a “steel porcupine”

With a ceasefire between Russia and Ukraine still far off, the best way to guarantee Ukraine’s security, its supporters say, is to arm it to the teeth. To that end, on March 19th the European Commission outlined a two-part “porcupine strategy”. First, Europe would procure more weapons on Ukraine’s behalf, including crucial air-defence missiles. Second, it would boost Ukraine’s own defence industry, which it calls the most “cost-efficient way to support Ukraine’s military efforts”. The plan is the brainchild of Kaja Kallas, a former Estonian prime minister who is now the European Union’s top diplomat. She wants to double military aid to Ukraine this year, to €40bn ($44bn).

Ukraine had a big weapons industry during the Soviet era, but it largely vanished after independence in 1991. Nonetheless, there was an engineering base and a thriving new tech sector when Russia launched its full-scale invasion three years ago. The country had a solid manufacturing core and loads of engineering schools from which people with specialist knowledge switched over to defence, says Andriy Zagorodnyuk, a former defence minister who chairs the Centre for Defence Strategies, a think-tank in Kyiv. “Since 2022 the development has been extremely active,” he adds. Whereas arms procurement in the West typically takes years, in Ukraine an idea can be turned into a weapon in a soldier’s hands within months.

Last year Ukrainian arms firms churned out $10bn-worth of kit, according to a report by the Ukrainian Institute for the Future (UIF), another think-tank. That was a three-fold increase from 2023, and ten-fold from 2022. The more than 800 private and state-owned enterprises in the defence field employ 300,000 skilled workers. Oleksandr Kamyshin, who oversees the defence industry for Volodymyr Zelensky, Ukraine’s president, says that this year production will be worth about $15bn, but the sector has the capacity for $35bn. The constraint is lack of money.

The UIF report says 30% of Ukraine’s needs are being met by local production, but Mr Zagorodnyuk thinks it nearer 50%. Production is steadily rising, despite Russian strikes on factories. “Some facilities have been hit five times or more,” says Mr Zagorodnyuk. “But they survive.” The factories are both dispersed and sprawling, which makes them resilient to attacks.

This year Ukraine expects to build 5m first-person-view (FPV) battlefield drones, up from 2m last year. It aims to make 30,000 bigger long-range drones. And Mr Zelensky has set a target of 3,000 sophisticated cruise missiles, such as the new Long Neptune, with a range of 1,000km, and “missile-drones”, such as the turbojet-powered Palianytsia. Ukraine is also testing its own ballistic missiles on Russian targets. (Fabian Hoffmann, a missile expert, reckons those numbers for big missiles may be ambitious.)

Innovation has made Ukraine’s electronic-warfare technology cutting-edge. Nico Lange, a former German defence-ministry official, thinks it now outstrips Russian and Western systems. One recent success has been the Lima jammer, which scrambles the guidance system of the Russian glide bombs that had been devastating Ukraine’s defensive positions.

Ukraine is also boosting production of traditional materiel. Last year it made over 2.5m artillery and mortar shells, helped by partnerships with Norway’s Nammo and KNDS, a Franco-German firm. Monthly production of the highly regarded Bohdana self-propelled howitzer, made by Ukraine’s KZVV, has accelerated from six to around 20. That is three times as fast as Nexter, a French firm, can make its expensive CAESAR guns.

Yet there are gaps in what Ukraine can produce, making joint ventures with European and American firms vital. The chassis for armoured vehicles must still be imported. Rheinmetall, a German defence giant, recently opened the first of two factories in Ukraine to make its Lynx infantry fighting vehicle. Another challenge is to reduce reliance on Western air-defence systems, especially American ones. The quantity needed is “so vast that it can’t be met with imports”, says Mr Zagorodnyuk. In January Oleksandr Syrskyi, the country’s commander-in-chief, confirmed that Ukraine is developing a system that can shoot down ballistic missiles. A joint venture with the French firm Thales will provide radar and optoelectronics.

Direct European investment in Ukrainian defence firms is hampered by the country’s dodgy legal system. Mr Lange says investments should go to more dynamic private companies, not state ones. Ukrainian companies’ supply chains also have problems. Fabrice Pothier, a former NATO official, worries about dependence on Chinese components for drones. Europe, he says, should provide the Ukrainians with “optics, gyroscopes, sensors and flight controllers”.

One quick way to get kit into Ukrainian fighters’ hands is the “Danish model”. Ukraine identifies priorities; Denmark pays; and Danish experts evaluate suppliers and oversee fulfilment. Last year the Danes bought 18 Bohdana howitzers for Ukraine’s armed forces. On April 3rd Denmark pledged a further €264m. But at a European summit on March 20th, Ms Kallas’s proposal was watered down to a €5bn effort, mainly to buy ammunition. Some accused her of failing to do the diplomatic groundwork. She is determined to revive her plan. ■