Ukraine has been waging a global campaign against Russian interests. Cheap, portable drones are increasingly expanding what’s possible against a wide range of targets, including Russian merchant vessels and foreign-based mercenaries.
They have also allowed Ukraine to strike key targets deep inside Russia without deploying conventional military forces, as with Operation Spiderweb last year. This broader Ukrainian asymmetric strategy has been in place since 2023.
Cheap drones can be launched from a wide range of seemingly innocuous places. Spiderweb used civilian trucks, but alternatives include cargo ships that could be used to launch drones, or even low-cost missiles, greatly expanding the range of potential threats that Russia must guard against.
Unable to match Russia’s conventional resources, Ukraine has increasingly sought to disrupt Russian interests wherever in the world Moscow projects influence. Whether targeting the financial networks that help sustain Russia’s war effort, disrupting Wagner and later Africa Corps operations, or threatening military assets deep inside Russia, Kyiv has steadily expanded the geographic scope of the conflict.
Cristian Terheș, a Romanian Member of the European Parliament, argues such operations are consistent with Ukraine’s right to self-defense. “Russia is bombing Ukrainian civilian infrastructure on a daily basis,” he said in an interview. “It is expected that Ukraine will respond by undermining that war effort in accordance with its right to self-defense under international law.” Russia, meanwhile, has called Ukrainian attacks on shipping illegal, while failing to acknowledge that it has been firing on merchant vessels since 2022.
Many of these attacks by both sides have occurred in the Black Sea, but Ukraine’s campaign ranges far and wide. In late 2023, Ukrainian military intelligence operators were reported to be operating in Sudan, where they supported government forces with drone operations against Wagner personnel. Wagner’s presence there helped Moscow exploit Sudanese gold to finance its war and blunt the impact of Western sanctions.
Ukraine’s campaign also extended to West Africa. Reports indicated Ukrainian intelligence supported Malian rebels with drone training and intelligence for use against Wagner convoys. More than 80 Russians were said to have died in a July 2024 attack that Ukraine said involved its forces. In Syria, Ukrainian operatives reportedly shared drones with the rebels.
At sea, Kyiv attacked the tanker shadow fleet vessel Qendil in the Mediterranean in December. A few weeks earlier, the Russian-linked tanker Mersin was damaged by a series of external explosions off the coast of Senegal. According to Le Monde, investigators considered a Ukrainian operation among the possible explanations.
In April, the Associated Press, citing Libyan officials, reported that Ukrainian drone specialists operating from western Libya had launched what Russia claimed was a sea-drone attack against the LNG tanker Arctic Metagaz in the Mediterranean, further extending Kyiv’s campaign to neutralize the shadow fleet, which is helping finance Moscow’s war.
“Ukraine has acquired capabilities that could support drone operations beyond its territory, but their use depends on the availability of launch infrastructure and operational priorities,” said Dmytro Zhmailo, deputy head of the Ukrainian Security and Cooperation Center, an independent analytical organization, in an interview.
In the Black Sea, Ukraine has regularly struck Russian shadow fleet tankers. But now, it is developing sea drones designed to intercept and seize sanctioned vessels instead of destroying them. They can travel hundreds of miles, remain dormant until activated, launch first-person-view (FPV) drones inland, and even target Russian fighter jets. Technical problems persist, of course — in June, Ukraine apologized to Greece after a wayward explosives-filled sea drone was found near the Ionian island of Lefkada.
Containerized launch systems concealed aboard commercial ships or trucks, and which can be controlled from far away, offer an opportunity to strike an enemy in ways that were once unthinkable. Such operations are likely to become much more common.
“Ukraine’s actions against Russian interests abroad – whether shipping or mercenary networks – raise costs and risks for Moscow. That alone has value,” Ben Hodges, the former commanding general of US Army Europe, told this author.
Others believe Ukraine should expand the model. Xen, a former US Special Forces operator who trained Ukrainian special forces, argues Kyiv has already demonstrated it can strike Russian interests abroad without provoking major escalation, as with the strikes on shadow fleet tankers. However, he also warns that the global deployment of drones isn’t limited to the Ukrainians.
“Cheap, mass-produced autonomous drones pose a strategic threat to carrier strike groups and even the US homeland,” Xen said in an interview. “With autonomy increasingly viable at price points around $2,000 per drone, offense is scaling faster than countermeasures.”
Bryan Pickens, a former US Army Green Beret who fought in Ukraine, similarly told this author Ukraine should work with NATO partners to contest Russian and Chinese influence in regions such as Africa and Latin America.
“Whether Ukraine can conduct such operations abroad depends less on technology than on strategic priorities and available resources,” Zhmailo said. The lack of political willpower in the West becomes the primary blocker, not the technology.
“The growing emphasis on technology allows Ukraine to extend its operational footprint without proportionally increasing manpower,” said Ed Bogan, a former CIA officer, said in an interview. “As technology becomes more effective, personnel can be allocated elsewhere.”
In August 2025, a Hudson Institute report by Luke Coffey and Can Kasapoğlu argued Ukrainian planners were likely exploring ways to containerize sea drones aboard commercial ships, enabling covert attacks against Russian naval facilities as far away as Russia’s Pacific coast.
Projecting military power overseas historically required significant infrastructure. Now, Ukraine is demonstrating that small intelligence teams armed with inexpensive commercial drones can increasingly produce strategic effects once reserved for major military powers.
David Kirichenko is a Ukrainian-American freelance journalist who has been covering Russia’s full-scale war against Ukraine since 2022, and is an Associate Research Fellow at the Henry Jackson Society. He can be found on X/Twitter @DVKirichenko.
Europe’s Edge is CEPA’s online journal covering critical topics on the foreign policy docket across Europe and North America. All opinions expressed on Europe’s Edge are those of the author alone and may not represent those of the institutions they represent or the Center for European Policy Analysis. CEPA maintains a strict intellectual independence policy across all its projects and publications.
