40,000 interceptors to be delivered to the army this month - Fedorov
Some 40,000 interceptor drones will be delivered to the Ukrainian army in January of this year, Minister of Defense of Ukraine Mykhailo Fedorov has announced.
"Back in February of last year, we started working on interceptors. And we even made a real-time R&D format: at the Chernihiv border, we allowed all the companies that made interceptors, and paid them $20,000 Shahed UAV. They began to develop, and the money followed each the downed UAV. At the time, no one believed in it. But this month, 40,000 thousand interceptors will be delivered to the army," Fedorov said during a meeting with journalists.
According to him, he "has already gone through the entire staff of the Ministry of Defense" and he and his team "understand very well the structure of the Ministry of Defense's expenditures, the deficit of the Ministry of Defense for this year."
"But thanks to high-quality data, we clearly understand where money is being spent and where savings can be made. We have all the necessary experience to change the rules of the game," Fedorov said.
In addition, the minister spoke about three consultants: two American R&D teams (Center for Strategic and International Studies CSIS and Rand), and the British RUSI. He also emphasized constant communication with the military.
"We have the Army of Drones system. Bonus is ePoints, which provides high-quality data from the battlefield. We understand the mathematics of war. We understand how much manpower and equipment each unit hits, to what depth, which weapons are effective in combat conditions. We have our own combat unit that directly participates in battles. We know about war from the battlefield, not from offices," Fedorov said.
At the same time, he emphasized that "war is not only about combat operations, it is also about management, logistics, supply, and cognitive war."
"We have a large background of military projects that we have implemented," Fedorov added.