Media: Ukraine developing “unstoppable” AI-powered attack drone with Western backing

Ukraine is developing artificially intelligent drones that will be harder for Russia to shoot down.

The push to create an image recognition targeting system, which can autonomously hunt and strike targets, is backed by more than £200 million in Western finance from a UK-led drone coalition, The Telegraph reports.

Kateryna Chernohorenko,Ukraine’s deputy defence minister, said the system would make one-way attack drones less susceptible to Russian electronic blockers and allow pilots to operate them further from the front line.

The official, who leads Kyiv’s negotiations on drones, said it was being developed as a “joint venture” alongside members of the £1.2 billion scheme.

“The great challenge is the last mile of engagement taking into account that more and more individual electronic warfare systems are available,” Chernohorenko said.

“Our drones should be more effective and should be guided towards the target without any operators.

“It should be based on visual navigation. We also call it ‘last-mile targeting’, homing in according to the image.”

The drone would be launched and piloted by a human to about a mile before their target.

At that point, AI would take over, guiding the drone to its eventual target and making it harder for Russia to jam any signals back to the pilot.

A fifth of the finances raised through the drone capability coalition, spearheaded by Britain and Latvia, is being set aside by Kyiv for the manufacture of the next generation of combat drones.