>>> France Faces Unprecedented Early Wildfire Risks Straining Firefighters
"It is our assessment that it is highly likely that the Kremlin conducted a coordinated UAV campaign over Europe," said Charlie Edwards, a senior IISS fellow.
The intelligence operations targeted more than a dozen NATO countries alongside Ireland to map military logistics and conduct psychological warfare.
It represented "a series of tactical successes for the Kremlin" and "a strategic failure of allied defences" which were designed for conventional military threats rather than low-cost, low-flying drones, Edwards said.
The defense thinktank noted that Western response options, including deploying anti-drone lasers or utilizing police helicopters, were either abandoned over safety concerns or failed to progress.
"The identification of two Russian private military contractors confirmed the militarisation of shadow fleet tankers, not as hypothesis but as operational practice," the IISS report said.
>>> Convicted People Smuggler Avoids UK Detection Following Brexit Borders Change
The report concluded that Russia's main foreign military intelligence agency, the GRU, likely orchestrated the entire aerial surveillance campaign across the European continent.
