NATO adopts Ukrainian tactics to fight Russian drones — Rutte

NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte announced that the alliance is incorporating Ukraine's strategies for combating Russian drones and will soon deploy advanced interception technologies. He added that using expensive missiles to shoot down cheap drones is no longer feasible, so other solutions are needed.

NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte said this in an interview with Bloomberg Television on Friday, September 26.

NATO is learning from Ukraine and preparing new tools

Rutte emphasized that Western militaries cannot continue to destroy small drones with half-million- or million-dollar missiles. He explained that the alliance is quickly learning practical lessons from Ukrainian units and developing alternative technologies. He said that a number of new solutions will be deployed in the coming weeks.

"It is not sustainable that you would take down thousand or two-thousand dollar costing drones with missiles that cost you maybe half a million or a million dollars. All of us are rapidly developing the technologies and learning from Ukrainians," Rutte told Bloomberg.

When asked about the equipment shortage, he replied bluntly: "In the short term, yes." Mr. Rutte added that NATO is working on solutions and will begin implementing them soon. He said the goal is to have effective interception technologies that complement traditional countermeasures.

Over the past few days, allies have publicly disagreed about how to respond to Russian jets crossing into NATO airspace. However, during a tense meeting in Moscow this week, European diplomats warned the Kremlin that NATO is prepared to respond with full force to any further violations of its airspace, including shooting down Russian planes.

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