Lithuania will allocate additional €20 million for the purchase of drones

The Lithuanian government will soon allocate an additional €20 million for the purchase of various types of combat and reconnaissance drones.

Lithuanian Minister of Defense Laurynas Kasčiūnas announced this on the social network X (Twitter).

According to him, the drones will be purchased for the Lithuanian Armed Forces. In addition, part of the funds will be used to train instructors and UAV operators who will adopt the Ukrainian experience.

“This will allow us [Lithuania – ed.] to reach a new quality level in the process of training drone instructors,” Kasčiūnas said.

He added that the next step would be to integrate drone capabilities into the Lithuanian Armed Forces.

According to him, the concept of integrating drones into the Lithuanian army will be presented by September.

At the beginning of July, the Defence Materiel Agency under the Lithuanian Ministry of National Defence announced the purchase of various types of drones for €36 million. They are bought urgently from Latvian and foreign manufacturers.

In particular, it regards small reconnaissance drones by the Latvian company Edge Autonomy and reconnaissance mini-drones by the Estonian company Threod Systems, as well as Lithuanian quadcopters by UAB Deftools.

The vast majority of the drones are to be delivered this fall, and the rest – in early 2025.

The Lithuanian Ministry of Defense said that by 2030, about €200 million would be spent on the purchase of all types of unmanned systems. On average, they plan to spend €30 million a year.

In recent years, the Lithuanian defense industry has increased its capacity to produce various drones.

Lithuania began to pay more attention to drones after Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine. The Great War has shown the significant potential of drones, which are intensively used on the modern battlefield.