EU leaders have been calling for the building of a "drone wall" after some 20 Russian drones entered Polish airspace last month, followed by drone incidents over airports in Denmark and Germany.

European Union leaders are debating the establishment of a 'drone wall' to counter increasing drone incursions, particularly after Russian drones entered Polish airspace. The proposed system would integrate radars, fighter jets, interceptor drones, missiles, and electronic warfare tools to detect and neutralize drones across the continent.

The initiative faces significant hurdles, including high costs, the need for cross-border cooperation, and disagreements over who should control the project. While some experts believe the system could be operational within a year if there is strong political support, others caution that it will require years of development and adaptation, drawing lessons from Ukraine's ongoing drone defense efforts.

What is a drone wall and why is the EU discussing one?

After Poland shot down Russian drones that entered its airspace in September, several other drone-related incidents across Europe have left EU leaders increasingly anxious about airspace protection. They're urgently calling for a defense system, throwing up terms like a drone wall. But the proposal remains in flux, diplomats and officials have told Reuters. So, what is a drone wall, and how would it work? Such a defense system would detect incoming drones and be able to counter them. Here's Robert Tollast, research fellow at the Royal United Services Institute. It's about integrating all of your air defense assets to work together in tandem from ground radars, fighter jets, cheap interceptor drones, missiles, the whole range of capabilities and electronic warfare to jam these drones, all working in tandem around the clock. Tollast says cost-effectiveness is key. For the Poland incursion on September 9, NATO deployed F-35 and F-16 fighter jets, helicopters and a Patriot air defense system collectively worth billions of dollars. The Russian drones they were responding to cost a tiny fraction of that price. You just can't be firing hundreds or even thousands of million-dollar or half-a-million-dollar missiles at these drones that generally cost about $50,000 each. That would be the Russians imposing a huge cost on us. Tollast says technologies such as cheap interceptor drones and lasers exist already, but have yet to be scaled up. The EU initiative is a test of its ambitions to play a greater role in defense, which traditionally falls to national governments and NATO. And it's a challenge to Europe's ability to take more responsibility for its own security, as demanded by Donald Trump and many U.S. presidents before him. The proposal is also caught up in a power struggle over who should control major European defense projects. Germany and France are wary of handing power to the European Commission, the EU's executive body, diplomats told Reuters. Experts say the plan needs broad support from European governments to secure access to EU funding. To try to win more support from southern and western nations, the Commission has broadened the original concept from an integrated thicket of sensors, jamming systems and weapons along the eastern border, to a web of anti-drone systems across the continent. Once the Commission has fleshed out its proposal, EU governments will decide whether to give it the green light. But experts say cost, scale and cross-border integration remain major challenges, with decisions to be made on which systems to buy, where to use them, and how to link them all together. Tollest added, Ukraine's drone defense efforts in the Russian war show it's likely to be an evolving project. That's a constantly evolving evolution between the attacking side and the defending side. So we'll be standing up different capabilities to try and defend European airspace with the drone wall. So it's not going to be an announcement, like we've now built the drone wall. It's going to be something that will take a number of years. However, some officials and industry executives say they can see the initiative up and running within a year, if the EU leaders can show serious political will.

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