Lithuania aims to deploy integrated anti-drone system by mid-2027

Lithuania’s integrated anti-drone system should be operational by the end of 2027, although Defence Minister Robertas Kaunas hopes it can be completed by midyear, LRT reported.

The system is being developed to combine different airspace surveillance and drone-destruction capabilities. “We have written the end of 2027 into the programme, but I would like it to be at least the middle of 2027,” Kaunas said in a podcast published by politika.lt.

Kaunas said Lithuania and Poland were working to establish whether a drone that flew through Lithuanian airspace was the same one later found near the Polish coast. Intelligence officials from the two countries are also communicating, and the drone is being examined.

Poland has priority in investigating the drone and is proceeding cautiously because it was initially suspected that it might be booby-trapped. Kaunas said the incident could have been a provocation in which the drone fell, officials began examining it and an explosion then occurred.

“This is how Russia operates. Anything is possible,” he said, adding that Polish officials would inform Lithuania after extracting and recovering the drone’s data.

The other drone was shot down by an Italian Eurofighter. Kaunas said it was a Russian Gerbera drone carrying 10 kilograms of explosives.

He said Gerbera drones had been modified to make them more difficult to detect. Earlier versions had been described as inexpensive white foam drones intended mainly to draw fire from air-defence missiles and other systems.

Kaunas thanked Italy’s defence minister and the pilots who decided to act despite difficult conditions, including fog and darkness. The drone was neutralised, but investigations are continuing and officials are still piecing together the full picture.

He said the two incidents had provided additional lessons. In one case, officials received information that a drone had travelled 140 to 160 kilometres in 20 minutes. Kaunas said that speed appeared implausible unless the object had been a jet-powered drone, which would likely have produced a distinctive sound.

He said it was important to establish exactly what had happened, not to assign blame but to improve procedures and warn the public in time. Even when an object turns out to be birds, he said, issuing a warning can reduce the risk of casualties and other problems.

“It is better to scramble a fighter jet because of birds while we do not have other systems than not to scramble it because of a drone,” Kaunas said.