Russia is rapidly expanding a network of drone launch facilities along its western flank, creating the infrastructure to unleash substantially larger waves of attacks while potentially placing parts of NATO within range of its newest long-range weapons.
An investigation based on satellite imagery and leaked documents has identified at least 10 sites near Russia’s borders with Ukraine and Belarus equipped or being prepared for drone launches. At least 59 launch rails have reportedly been constructed, with roughly 20 apparently large enough to accommodate Russia’s latest generation of long-range strike drones.
The network spans existing military installations, converted civilian airfields and more remote sites across the Russian countryside. Its significance lies less in any immediate indication of Russian plans to attack NATO than in the scale of the military infrastructure Moscow is putting in place.
The expansion would allow Russian forces to generate larger and more sustained drone salvos against Ukraine while creating the potential to hold NATO territory at risk.
Mike Monnik, founder and chief executive of DroneSec, which analysed the satellite imagery, said Russia had “significantly expanded” its drone network to increase its ability to attack Ukraine and potentially threaten NATO states.
Russia has increasingly moved beyond the relatively unsophisticated Iranian-designed Shahed drones that characterised earlier stages of its campaign. Newer jet-powered variants are believed to have ranges approaching 1,000km, while the latest Geran-4 and Geran-5 models can reportedly carry warheads of about 90kg and travel faster than earlier designs.
The combination of greater range, speed and numbers is complicating Ukraine’s air-defence calculations.
One newly identified facility is reportedly capable of storing more than 1,000 drones, while additional launch infrastructure is being constructed elsewhere. The sites are supplied by an expanding Russian production network, including the Alabuga complex, which is estimated to manufacture about 6,000 drones annually.
The industrial scale matters. Russia is increasingly treating drones not as supplementary battlefield equipment but as a mass-produced weapons system capable of overwhelming defensive networks through volume.
Ukrainian intelligence has also warned that Moscow is experimenting with equipping some Geran drones with air-to-air missiles, potentially allowing unmanned aircraft to threaten the fighters and other platforms deployed to intercept them.
For NATO, the developments reinforce a problem that extends beyond Ukraine. European militaries have spent decades optimising air defence around relatively small numbers of expensive aircraft and missiles, while Russia is demonstrating the potential of producing thousands of comparatively cheap unmanned systems.
There is no evidence that Moscow is preparing an imminent strike on NATO territory. But the growing infrastructure is nevertheless altering the strategic calculation.
A NATO official said drones had “fundamentally altered the character of modern warfare” and that the alliance was expanding its capacity to produce, operate and neutralise them “at scale”.
The race is becoming increasingly industrial rather than technological.
Russia’s expanding launch network suggests that the Kremlin is preparing for a future in which the decisive question is not whether a drone can penetrate an air-defence system, but whether the defender can afford to stop thousands of them.
That is a far more uncomfortable proposition for NATO than any single drone attack.
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