Russia can launch Shahed strike drones against Denmark, Germany, and Italy – and if it deploys sites in Belarus, its drones can even reach Spain.
Almost all European capitals, except for Lisbon, Portugal, are within the strike zone, according to Defense Express.
“With a flight range of 1,800 km, the drones are capable of attacking all Scandinavian countries, the Netherlands, most of Germany, and southern Italy.
If the range of the so-called Geran-2 reaches 2,500 km (its absolute maximum), the entire United Kingdom, Italy, and a significant part of France would be within the strike zone, adds the site.
But Portugal is miraculously spared – with the exception of a small corner of Bragança – and southern Spain is also out of reach.
Defense Express’s article comes after a number of drone incursions in northern Europe: only three nights ago, Copenhagen international airport, in Denmark, had to close due to the appearance of several drones in the airspace. The next night, drones invaded Norwegian airspace, forcing the closure of Gardermoen Airport, in Oslo – and earlier in the month, there were several drone incursions into Poland, during ‘massive strikes’ by Russia on Ukraine.
The reason for this story appears more ‘a warning’: NATO has to be alert, says the site.
Many have been remarking at how backwards NATO has been in coming forwards since Russian military planes invaded Poland’s airspace for 12 minutes last week, but in the last couple of days – and since President Trump advocated shooting encroaching Russian aircraft down – this reticence has retreated.
The latest message coming from the alliance is that Article 5 of the treaty (an attack on one is seen as an attack on all) is “ironclad”.
“Russia should be in no doubt: NATO and Allies will employ, in accordance with international law, all necessary military and non-military tools to defend ourselves and deter all threats from all directions”, said the alliance in a statement earlier this week.
With so much going on, it is at least heartening to realise this little corner of Europe is, for the time being at least, ‘out of range’.
