Perhaps no country on earth has become as adept at shooting down enemy drones as Ukraine because of its war with Russia. Now that the US is facing essentially the same drones in the Iran war, Volodymyr Zelensky's nation is sending interceptor drones and a team of experts to help the Pentagon, reports the New York Times. The US made the request last week, and "we reacted immediately," Zelensky tells the newspaper. The White House declined to comment.
For Kyiv, the move is both military and diplomatic. Ukraine has become a global test lab in stopping Iranian-designed "one-way" attack drones, which Russia uses heavily. And it does so on the cheap, relatively speaking, compared to the heavy missiles fired by the US to take down drones. Zelensky is hoping to trade that know-how for defensive systems Kyiv needs against ballistic missiles. He's also offering help to Middle Eastern governments—some closely tied to Moscow—in hopes they'll press Russia toward a pause in Ukraine, per the Times.
Axios, meanwhile, reports that the Pentagon could have had this help before the Iran war began. A Ukrainian team presented a PowerPoint presentation about seven months ago to their American counterparts explaining how their interceptor drones could help in a Mideast war, but the US decided not to buy the tech, according to the account. "Snubbing Ukraine's offer ranks as one of the biggest tactical miscalculations by the administration since the bombing of Iran began," the Axios report asserts.
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