Britain is right to back drones. Now it must move at wartime speed

After years of defence debates that were too often stuck in the past, the Government’s Defence Investment Plan finally takes meaningful steps towards embracing the future and a truth that modern warfare has made impossible to ignore: drones are no longer a specialist add-on.

The Government’s backing of £5 billion over four years across land, sea and air proves an understanding that autonomous vehicles are now central to how wars are fought, how borders are tested, and how governments are put under pressure.

It’s also important to credit the Government with understanding that drones are not a battlefield panacea. The point is not to swap hard military strength for uncrewed systems, but to make the forces around them more effective. Used properly, they can help warships, aircraft and soldiers see further, strike faster, absorb risk and survive in contested spaces.

But the crucial question now lies in delivery. What use is that cutting-edge technology if it's not available to us soon, or is out of date by the time it’s deployed?

While Britain has never been the largest nation, it has always punched above its weight because of its advantage as a world leader in innovation, engineering, intelligence, alliances, and the ability to turn new technology into practical advantage.

As far back as Agincourt, where the longbow turned the tide at a time when the English were outnumbered two-to-one, the country’s strength has lain in its ability to harness innovation and use technology to its advantage.

That is how a country punches above its weight. It plays to its strengths instead of trying to match larger powers platform for platform, factory for factory, or soldier for soldier.

But in recent years, the UK has had some trouble actually capitalising on its ability to innovate in a timely and cost-effective fashion.

The danger for Britain is that it moves too slowly. You cannot take five years (a lifetime in this field) to buy a system that may be obsolete in a fortnight. The technology changes quickly because it is being tested and refined in real combat every day. New sensors, new jamming methods, new tactics and new countermeasures are constantly appearing.

The MoD has already been warned of what happens when procurement moves too slowly. Ajax, the £6bn armoured fighting vehicle programme, became a byword for failure after the MoD turned what was meant to be an off-the-shelf vehicle into a bespoke platform with around 1,200 design changes. Soldiers later reported serious noise and vibration problems, with some reportedly stumbling out of vehicles, vomiting and unable to stand.

Britain cannot afford delays with drones and counter-drone systems. It needs faster routes from battlefield evidence to testing, from testing to contracts, and from contracts to production. It also needs to accept that some systems will be replaced quickly. That is not failure. In drone warfare, adaptation is part of the design.

Ukraine has shown that cheaper, faster, and more adaptable systems, from FPV drones to loitering munitions, can help David change the odds against Goliath, from the front lines to oil refineries far behind Russian lines. Modern war rewards speed, scale, electronic resilience, industrial capacity and the ability to replace losses quickly.

As Swedish foreign minister, I saw how seriously smaller European states took the shift in the threat environment after Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine. For countries within Vladimir Putin's reach, drones are not abstract technology. Reconnaissance systems, FPV attack drones, loitering munitions and interceptors are now part of war, deterrence and daily security.

Britain has made the right call. Now it has to prove it can build, buy, replace and stop drones faster than its adversaries can adapt. Announcing drones is easy. Building the industrial base, supply chains and defensive ecosystem around them is harder.

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Tobias Billström is the former Swedish foreign minister and Head of Strategy and Government Affairs at Nordic Air Defence.

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