Ukraine is prepared to sign a significant drone-defense agreement with the United States, CBS News reported on September 23, citing three
According to the outlet, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy is ready to finalize the deal on the sidelines of the United Nations General Assembly in New York City this week.
The agreement has not yet been signed, however, with the timing dependent on when the US is prepared to move forward.
Over the past year, the US Department of Defense and its Ukrainian counterpart have established a framework to expand the testing and production of Ukrainian defense technology, emphasized that the deal’s value will hinge on transferring Ukraine’s operational know-how alongside its hardware.
“It’s not just about having the tech. It’s about how the tech is used,” she told CBS News.
The conflict with Iran has highlighted the importance of Ukraine’s defense industry to the US and its allies, CBS News noted.
In the early stages, Iran began targeting American military installations across the Middle East with Shahed one-way attack drones, the same model Russia has deployed against Ukrainian cities. Because the US and Gulf states initially lacked cost-effective interception methods, Kyiv provided drone interceptors and personnel to assist.
Ukraine has since entered into defense agreements with Saudi Arabia, Qatar, and the United Arab Emirates, among other nations, pairing foreign <a s efforts to incorporate the lessons of Ukraine's drone warfare have been inconsistent, the outlet added.
CBS News reported that Ukrainian expertise was also required to integrate the Merops drones into US air-defense radars before they could be deployed in combat.
In August, the US Army phased out a drone battalion tasked with studying those lessons, while the Pentagon’s Drone Dominance Program invited American and select foreign companies, primarily Ukrainian ones, to compete for contracts.
The program aims to procure more than 200,000 drones by 2027, and Ukrainian manufacturer Skyfall secured its first round of funding earlier this year.
CBS News stated that it had reached out to the White House and the Pentagon for comment on the status of the drone deal and on the use of Ukrainian technology to defend bases in the Middle East.
The prospective agreement builds on a series of steps that have already integrated Ukrainian systems into the American military ecosystem.
On July 22, Ukraine and the US signed a bilateral statement of intent establishing a framework for the temporary export of Ukrainian unmanned systems to the US for testing by the Pentagon.
Ukrainian personnel have also trained US service members at Prince Sultan Air Base in Saudi Arabia on the Sky Map software, a command-and-control platform used to identify Shahed-type threats and coordinate interceptor drones.
