Lithuania improves drone response but remains unready for swarms

Lithuania has improved its ability to detect and intercept drones after the first Russian drone entered its airspace a year ago, but experts say the country is still doing too little to prepare for larger attacks, LRT reported.

Last week, Lithuania shot down an airborne drone carrying explosives after it crossed into the country. A year earlier, military radars lost track of a Russian drone that flew about 200 kilometres before crashing at the Gaižiūnai training ground.

This week, military radars tracked another Russian drone for about 100 kilometres before an Italian pilot shot it down.

“When you know where it is, you know what to do. The result is visible,” Lithuanian army commander Raimundas Vaikšnoras said.

Retired Major General Edvardas Mažeikis, a former commander of the Lithuanian Air Force, said the country had made “a big step forward” over the past year. But he added that although politicians say air defence is the priority, too little is being done in practice.

Residents of Kaišiadorys district witnessed the latest interception. One resident of Kruonis, a town, described hearing a blast as the drone was shot down.

“I had just run to the door when there was this impact and a shot. I thought, that’s it, the war has started,” the resident said.

The drone spent about half an hour in Lithuania. However, Eduardas Silva, the creator of the television programme Poligonas, said authorities sometimes hesitated to shoot down objects because of the potential collateral damage.

Mažeikis said that in peacetime, a target had to be identified precisely because the effects of an interception could spread over kilometres. A year ago, a fighter jet missile used to destroy a drone struck the roof of a house in Poland.

In some cases, there is not enough time to respond. Last Sunday, residents of Varėna district were woken by the sound of a drone. Radar detected an object that crossed Lithuania from Belarus in 40 minutes before flying into the Kaliningrad region.

Defence Minister Robertas Kaunas said the situation had been controlled and that officials would discuss existing response procedures with the Defence Staff. President Gitanas Nausėda disagreed, saying both the information system and the ability to use appropriate weapons should have been activated to destroy the drone.

Several days later, Poland found a Russian Gerbera drone carrying explosives on the Baltic Sea coast. Poland’s defence minister said the drone could have crossed all of Lithuania, then the Kaliningrad region, and continued over the Baltic Sea. He said the countries must prepare for similar incidents, which could happen repeatedly.

“You would not want to hear my answer. At the moment, we are not prepared for swarms,” said former Defence Minister Laurynas Kasčiūnas.

Prime Minister Mindaugas Sinkevičius said larger numbers of drones could create challenges if such incidents were to recur.

Experts said there were no easy solutions. Fighter flights are expensive, while ground-based air-defence systems are also costly. Silva said Lithuania needed a layered system combining inexpensive drones, missiles, fighter jets and potentially cheaper airborne platforms.

Latvia, which also shot down a drone a month ago, is considering buying turboprop aircraft. Experts say such planes could fill the gap between expensive fighter jets and ground-based air defence.