Ukraine has become a world leader in drone technology, overtaking even the United States. This was stated by US President Donald Trump's special envoy for Ukraine, General Keith Kellogg, at the Yalta European Strategy (YES) forum in Kiev, bTV reported.
Kellogg arrived in the Ukrainian capital on September 11 for an official visit. “Ukraine is now a world leader in defense technology. This alone is a strong enough argument for it to be accepted into the European Union“, he said.
According to him, drone technology has completely changed the nature of war, and the US and other countries are significantly lagging behind. “We Americans are behind… Many countries are lagging behind, and Ukrainians have rightly sensed the importance of these technologies and are already leaders in the world. But time is running out,” he warned.
Kellogg stressed that it was important for Washington to build a partnership with Kiev to share drone technology. Since the start of a full-scale Russian invasion in 2022, Ukraine has expanded its production of drones by land, air and sea, with plans to produce 30,000 long-range drones by 2025.
In July, President Volodymyr Zelensky announced that he had reached a deal with Trump to sell Ukrainian drones to the United States worth between $10 billion and $30 billion. In addition, Ukraine signed a major contract with the American company Swift Beat to jointly produce hundreds of thousands of drones this year.
Commenting on the course of the war, Kellogg said that Russia was “actually losing” and that its limited gains in the Donbas are far from a real victory.
“If moving in meters, not kilometers, is considered a success, then fine. But the cost to Russia is enormous and this is not appreciated enough“, he said. The general added that Moscow is too dependent on China and described Russia as the “junior partner“ in their alliance. “If Beijing stops its support today, the war will be over tomorrow“, Kellogg stressed. During the forum, President Zelensky personally thanked the US envoy for his efforts in support of Ukraine: “Every time you are here, General, we can sleep a little more peacefully. We would like you to travel to all Ukrainian cities.“