Russian drone and aircraft incursions are not a coincidence. Nor are the concurrent flights of unidentified drones across NATO’s eastern airspace. They send a warning that requires a response.
The continent now needs a system allowing allies to defend in layers, something more complex and flexible than an aerial Maginot Line.
There is no doubt about the need, because the continent’s military and civilian infrastructure is clearly extremely vulnerable.
On the night of September 9-10, around two dozen Russian military drones crossed the Polish border from Belarus. And while the drones were shot down or crashed without doing damage, the shock remained. If such a small, inexpensive device can penetrate deep into Poland, what else is possible?
In the following weeks, flights were grounded at Copenhagen Airport after unidentified drones hovered over the runways. In Germany, similar incursions forced temporary shutdowns at major airports, including Munich. A formation of unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) were seen over a Belgian F-35 base and others mapped bases and sensitive sites in northern Germany.
These were not acts of mass destruction, but they were serious acts of disruption — reminders that Europe’s skies are porous and that the line between battlefield and homeland has all but vanished.
European leaders are seriously worried, with Germany’s Chancellor Friedrich Merz saying Europe is “no longer at peace with Russia.”
So, what to do? The much-discussed “drone wall” initiative, launched by the Baltic states and now echoed in Brussels, is a start. But the metaphor misleads. Europe does not need static defenses. It needs a flexible, layered, and modular defense network — one that can detect, track, and neutralize threats in real time while plugging seamlessly into NATO systems and national authorities.
So how would such a “wall” actually work? What are its essential layers?
The first layer must aim to detect and classify. Modern drones are elusive, often masked by decoys or spoofing. Europe must therefore combine passive radio-frequency monitoring, acoustic arrays, and electro-optical and thermal sensors. Artificial intelligence can then fuse these inputs to forecast trajectories and intent, ensuring that defenders see clearly before they act.
The second layer is cost-effective engagement. Scrambling fighter jets or firing million-euro missiles at drones is unsustainable. Instead, electronic warfare — jamming, spoofing, and disrupting guidance signals — offers a cheaper line of defense. Where that fails, interceptor drones capable of high-speed pursuit and swarming can physically neutralize targets. The principle is simple: low-cost defense against low-cost attack.
The third layer is resilience and hardening. No system will stop every drone, so Europe must identify critical sites — energy depots, command centers, airports — and reinforce them with point-defense systems and physical protection. Selective shielding is better than blanket vulnerability.
No country has more battlefield experience with drones than Ukraine. Kyiv’s engineers and soldiers have learned, under fire, how to adapt, improvise, and scale counter-drone systems at speed. Their after-action reports, data, and innovations are a treasure trove for Europe. Embedding Ukraine’s lessons into European procurement, training, and doctrine would accelerate adaptation and ensure our defenses are stress tested against the most dangerous adversary of all: reality.
This is not charity. It is reciprocity. Ukraine helps us by fighting, innovating, and sharing its hard-won knowledge. We help Ukraine by integrating those lessons into a continental shield that protects both sides.
The obstacle is not technology but politics. Governments argue over whether this should be an EU program, a NATO mission, or a patchwork of national efforts. They quibble over terminology — “wall,” “dome,” “shield” — while the skies remain exposed. Europe cannot afford to wait three or four years for a perfect system. Each month of delay is an invitation to further incursions.
The answer is an industry-driven, modular approach: map the capabilities already available from start-ups and scale-ups, stitch them together into interoperable “capability bricks,” and field them quickly. Spiral development — incremental upgrades based on combat feedback — is far more effective than waiting for a flawless, all-encompassing solution.
A single strike on a refinery or power station could ripple through energy markets and political stability. A sustained campaign of drone incursions would corrode public trust in governments’ ability to protect their citizens. The threat is not hypothetical; it is already here.
Stopping the drones is possible. But it requires urgency, pragmatism, and imagination. Europe must act now to turn the rhetoric of a “drone wall” into a working shield — not perfect, but good enough to deny Moscow an easy advantage.
Ukraine has shown us what resilience looks like. The least we can do is learn quickly, act decisively, and build a defense that protects both them and us.
Arthur de Liedekerke is a Fellow with the Transatlantic Defense and Security Program at the Center for European Policy Analysis (CEPA). He is a Senior Director at Rasmussen Global, the political advisory founded by former NATO Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen, where he oversees the firm’s leading European Affairs team. He previously served as a Strategy Officer in the French Ministry for the Armed Forces
Nico Lange is a Senior Fellow at CEPA. He is also a Senior Fellow at the Munich Security Conference and teaches at the Chair of Military History at the University of Potsdam, and at the Hertie School of Governance. He served as Chief of Staff at the German Ministry of Defense from 2019-2022.
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.
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