Meanwhile, the Polish military is strengthening cooperation with Germany’s Bundeswehr under the East Shield project to boost the resilience of its eastern borders to attacks and hybrid warfare from Russia and Belarus, while negotiating with the United States, France and the United Kingdom to also involve their forces.

A spokesperson for the Polish Ministry of National Defence told Defense News that the military exercise, which is scheduled to be held this fall, is part of the group’s preparations for the post-war reality in Ukraine. Before the conflict ends, coalition nations want to reach a higher level of force coordination, and the drills are expected to contribute to their increased interoperability.

“The exercise planned on the territory of Poland is part of the preparatory activities of the Coalition of the Willing as part of future security guarantees for Ukraine. Its objectives include testing the command-and-control system, the organization of logistical support, and the deployment of troops, thereby confirming the force’s ability to operate once hostilities have ended,” the spokesperson said.

The decision to hold the forthcoming exercise in Poland reflects the country’s particular role as the logistical and infrastructure hub for the Multinational Force Ukraine (MNF-U), according to the Polish ministry representative.

“The core participants in the exercise on Polish territory will be France and the United Kingdom, acting as the framework nations of the Coalition of the Willing,” the spokesperson said.

The coalition is an informal group of nations led by London and Paris, established in 2025 to coordinate military and political support for Kyiv. While coordinating efforts with its French and British counterparts, the Polish ministry is also negotiating the participation of further allies in the fall drills.

“At the same time, military-to-military discussions are underway regarding the participation of other countries that are members of the Coalition of the Willing,” according to the spokesperson.

Under the country’s 10 billion zloty ($2.6 billion) East Shield initiative, the Polish military is advancing projects to bolster defensive infrastructure, including fortifications and natural terrain obstacles along the roughly 800 km (497 miles) of border with Russia’s Kaliningrad exclave and Belarus.

In a statement, the Polish military said that rather than a single continuous line of trenches, bunkers and reinforced concrete anti-tank obstacles, the East Shield is a diversified defensive infrastructure system that incorporates the lessons learned from the war in Ukraine, including the rapid increase in the use of drones and other unmanned systems.

“Depending on operational requirements, the project will also include the construction of logistics hubs, material storage facilities, fortification elements and shelters, as well as drone detection and tracking systems using radar, thermal imaging and acoustic sensors,” the statement said. “These capabilities will help effectively counter unmanned aerial systems, which, as the war in Ukraine has demonstrated, are being used with increasing frequency.”

Poland is seeking to make East Shield a priority project for NATO, and, as part of its discussions with allies, the nation’s military has established cooperation with Germany’s Bundeswehr.

In July 2026, the Polish Army said that a German military engineering unit had been deployed to Poland on a rotational basis to participate in developing the infrastructure.

“At the invitation of the Polish side, German soldiers are supporting the Polish Armed Forces in expanding defensive infrastructure on NATO’s north-eastern flank,” said Colonel Marek Pietrzak, a spokesperson for the General Staff of the Polish Armed Forces. “The involvement of the German contingent is a practical demonstration of Allied solidarity and the result of the steadily expanding military cooperation between Poland and Germany. The initiative forms part of NATO’s broader efforts to strengthen deterrence and defense capabilities on the Alliance’s eastern flank.”

Meanwhile, Polish defense officials say they are in talks with Baltic and Nordic states, including Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania and Finland, to exchange experiences and join forces on border strengthening efforts.

Deputy Prime Minister and National Defence Minister Władysław Kosiniak-Kamysz says that Poland also wants to strengthen its cooperation with the United States, the UK and France.

“Polish and German soldiers are working side by side to strengthen defensive infrastructure along the border and reinforce deterrence on NATO’s eastern flank,” Kosiniak-Kamysz said in a July 22 social media post. “This is only the beginning. Reconnaissance is underway ahead of support from French troops, and in September, reconnaissance involving American soldiers will begin.”

The committee’s July 21 vote follows a U.S. diplomatic note submitted to the Bulgarian government. In the note, Washington requested Sofia’s approval for the deployment of up to eight Boeing KC-135 tanker aircraft and up to 250 U.S. troops with related gear at Bezmer Air Base in eastern Bulgaria between July 24 and Oct. 1, state-owned news agency BTA reported.

The request is based on the 2006 Defense Cooperation Agreement between the United States and Bulgaria under which the air base is one of the agreed joint-use facilities.

Defense Minister Dimitar Stoyanov said the country’s military intelligence service believed the extended U.S. military presence would pose no direct threat to Bulgaria’s security. However, parliamentary approval was necessary due to public concerns linked to the presence of U.S. military aircraft earlier this year at the civilian Vasil Levski Sofia Airport, Stoyanov said.

Following the committee’s decision, Bulgaria’s unicameral parliament, the National Assembly, is to give its authorization at a plenary session. The plenary vote is expected to mirror the committee’s outcome. Of the committee’s 19 members, ten represent the ruling Progressive Bulgaria party of Prime Minister Rumen Radev. The party also holds a majority of 131 of the parliament’s 240 seats.

Slavi Vassilev, the deputy chairman of the ruling Progressive Bulgaria’s parliamentary group, said in a social media post that the parliament’s decision “will put Bulgaria in a position to ask something of its allies.”

“The aircraft were at a civilian airport. We politely asked for them to be moved. They politely asked for them to be brought back. We informed the public of that request, without pretending they were there merely ‘for exercises,’ and we will decide the matter in parliament, as required by law,” Vassilev said. “After that, it will be our turn to politely ask for something else. And we will get it.”

The business, which operates a plant in Singapore, is discussing cooperation with local partners elsewhere to extend its production footprint in the coming two years, an executive said.

Ira Hughes, a senior director of sales at Doodle Labs, told Defense News the company specializes in long-range, wireless mesh networking solutions that power drones and robotics. In Ukraine, the business works with local suppliers of unmanned systems and the Ukrainian military to adapt its radio solutions to the evolving threats on the battlefield.

“One of our customers makes two different types of drones. They make an inexpensive drone … with a cheap radio and camera system in it, and then they make a drone with our radio in it, and they use that for higher-value targets,” Hughes said. “They’ll go back to us and say: For vehicles with jammers, tanks with jammers, we go with your radios first, and this lets us change channels very quickly if we come under a jam.”

“We also have a very wide range of frequencies we can upgrade to in a single radio,” Hughes added. “So if we can move from the channels that they’re trying to jam to an unjammed channel, we continue to operate, and we can continue to get to the target.”

Amid rising demand for its radio systems, Doodle Labs is holding talks with manufacturers in the U.S. and Europe to launch local production. In particular, the company keeps an eye on a specific stateside policy provision.

“We are working on the ability to do U.S. manufacturing when needed. We’ll manufacture with a third party … and as the NDAA requirements change in the United States and the Made in America incentives come, we’ll be prepared and able to manufacture in the United States,” Hughes said, referring to the National Defense Authorization Act, an annual legislative vehicle for enacting defense-acquisition policies.

As drone production continues to increase in Western countries, allied nations will also need to ramp up their radio production as the existing supply chains lag behind the demand for unmanned systems, according to Hughes.

“A lot of those systems need advanced radios to be able to operate at the ranges and in the difficult conditions that they operate in,” he said. “We can make tens of thousands of radios a month, millions of radios a year if we need to.”

The company is in talks with a French producer to launch manufacturing of its solutions abroad and is also looking for partners in other European countries, according to a senior company representative.

Oleksii Konik, the co-founder of Trinity Robotics, told Defense News that the company initially planned to make around 1,100 UGVs this year, but, with the Ukrainian military increasing its orders, the business is ramping up throughput at its facilities in Ukraine.

“We work with the [Ukrainian] military procurement agency and more than 20 military units directly,” Konik said. “The most important mission that we have now is the robotization of the battlefield, because only this will allow our country to win the war.”

The company’s flagship UGV, Konyk One, is suitable for performing logistics and medical evacuation tasks. At the same time, Trinity Robotics is working on a new variant that will be fitted with a turret. This will enable users to deploy the UGV for combat operations, according to the co-founder.

While some Ukrainian officials expect the country’s ban on exporting weapons could be lifted this year, local defense companies are currently prohibited from exporting their wares. Meanwhile, Trinity Robotics is discussing cooperation with partners from allied countries to produce its unmanned vehicles abroad.

“We are looking for partners, manufacturers from Europe that manufacture trucks, vehicles, military parts,” Konik said. “We have an opportunity to create a joint enterprise in Europe … to produce our UGVs.”

“This will allow us to give additional volumes of our UGVs to our end users who are interested in that,” he said.

Under Kyiv’s Build with Ukraine program, joint manufacturing isprimarily intended to cover the needs of the country’s armed forces, but surplus output can be exported to other countries.

The company’s co-founder said that Trinity Robotics is currently negotiating with an unnamed French producer to launch a joint venture and produce its UGVs abroad. The Ukrainian manufacturer is also working to secure funds for its expansion, with recent investors including Sweden’s Front Ventures and Hede Capital Partners.

In its standard version, Konyk One weighs 460 kg (1,014 lb) and has a load capacity of up to 300 kg, according to data from the producer.

The development, which is part of Poland’s efforts to acquire long-range missiles and bolster its deterrence posture against Russia, could also facilitate the weapon’s sale to other European Union member states.

Under the plan, Barracuda-500M missiles are to be initially assembled, and subsequently produced, at PGZ’s subsidiary Military Aviation Works No. 2 in Bydgoszcz, in Poland’s west, PGZ said in a statement.

Władysław Kosiniak-Kamysz, Polish deputy prime minister and defense minister, said during the official plan signing ceremony that the deal marks the first agreement of this type initiated by Anduril Industries with a European partner.

“Today, the Polish raison d’état is here, in Bydgoszcz. It demonstrates … a great Polish-American investment in the development of the most modern technologies for long-range, precise, but also inexpensive … cruise missiles that can reach 900 kilometers without any problem,” Kosiniak-Kamysz said.

PGZ and Anduril Industries are teaming up to “manufacture thousands of SLB-500M systems. In subsequent phases of the project, PGZ and Anduril will gradually increase the share of local suppliers by incorporating a growing number of Polish and European-made components,” the Polish group said in a statement.

The Polish company said local production could make the Barracuda eligible for purchases by other EU countries under the bloc’s Security Action for Europe (SAFE) scheme. The low-cost loan program is designed to enable member states to strengthen their defense capabilities amid Russia’s ongoing invasion of Ukraine. Poland was allocated the largest share of the funds, with around €43.7 billion ($49.9 billion).

“The objective is to develop a Polish version of the Barracuda as a product manufactured predominantly in Europe and compliant with the requirements of the SAFE program,” according to PGZ.

Brian Moran, Anduril’s vice president for Europe, was quoted in an Anduril statement as saying: “Bringing Barracuda production to Poland with PGZ, we are helping build a European industrial base that can replenish precision fires at the speed of relevance, and taking major steps toward the transformation of defense manufacturing on the continent.”

Poland initially planned to procure two aircraft using loans from the European Union, but the agreement with Madrid will allow Warsaw to increase its tanker order to four units.

A spokesperson for the Polish Ministry of National Defence told Defense News that Poland and Spain have signed a memorandum that obliges the two countries to carry out the acquisition together. The deal enables the Spanish government to share its delivery slots with the Polish ministry.

By joining forces with Madrid for the procurement, Warsaw will receive the MRTTs by 2030. The agreement was signed in late June 2026 during an official visit to Spain by Władysław Kosiniak-Kamysz, Poland’s Deputy Prime Minister and National Defence Minister. During the visit, Kosiniak-Kamysz met with his Spanish counterpart, Margarita Robles.

The Polish minister has announced “that, within two weeks’ time, Poland will arrange with Madrid the details of the contract to buy tanker and transport aircraft. Poland will order four A330 MRTT tankers,” the spokesperson said. “We are currently at the final stage of talks.”

Under the EU’s Security Action for Europe (SAFE) scheme, the Polish defense budget is to absorb funds of around €43.7 billion ($49.9 billion) in low-cost loans. The program is designed to allow member states to bolster their defense capabilities amid Russia’s ongoing invasion of Ukraine, and Poland is to receive the largest share of the funds. The program stipulates that the loans must be disbursed by the end of 2030.

“The order from European group Airbus will be financed through the SAFE mechanism,” according to the defense spokesperson.

The value of the planned purchase was not disclosed by the Polish ministry. In May 2026, Italy unveiled plans to acquire six A330 MRTTs in a deal worth some €1.4 billion ($1.6 billion).

Fighter jet race

The latest development confirms that Poland has chosen the Airbus aircraft over the only competitor that had also been considered, Boeing’s KC-46.

Meanwhile, U.S. and European manufacturers continue to compete for another major aircraft order in the pipeline. Poland’s government is mulling plans to buy up to 32 new fighter jets, with some of the evaluated options including: Lockheed Martin’s F-35; Boeing’s F-15EX; and the Eurofighter Typhoon, a jet manufactured by a consortium of Airbus, BAE Systems and Leonardo.

With deliveries of the first of the country’s 32 ordered F-35s initiated last June, Lockheed Martin is encouraging officials in Warsaw to double down on the Polish military’s commitment to fifth-generation jets. At the same time, the manufacturers of the two air superiority aircraft that are also in the race are looking favorably at recent statements by Brig. Gen. Tomasz Jatczak, the inspector of the Polish Air Force.

On June 19, Jatczak and Kevin Fesler, Boeing’s executive director overseeing business development and strategy for air dominance, participated in a panel discussion during the annual Warsaw Defense Fair event. The general stated he is “an advocate for air superiority” as securing this capability could provide Poland with “a key element of deterrence” against Russia.

Meanwhile, in its campaign for the potential Polish deal, the consortium behind the Eurofighter is benefiting from the recent move by Business Centre Club, a Polish employers’ organization, which backed the jet in the race. On June 23, the group issued an open letter to a group of decision-makers including Poland’s president, prime minister and national defense minister, calling on them to select the Typhoon.

“A mixed fleet, combining the stealth capabilities of the F-35 with the kinematics and missile count of an air superiority aircraft such as the Eurofighter offers greater freedom of rational use, resistance to the exhaustion of combat assets, and greater operational flexibility than 64 aircraft of the same type,” the Business Centre Club said in its missive.

The open letter also argues that Poland’s defense and aerospace industries could gain considerable benefits from involvement in the European jet’s supply chain.

“Another F-35 contract is one in which the Polish industry remains a customer, not a partner. The Eurofighter consortium … has already declared that Poland’s participation in the program would mean that approximately 40 percent of the investment value would remain in Poland through the supply chain, not just the purchase of a finished aircraft,” according to the organization.

Meanwhile, the Polish authorities are also considering joining the Global Combat Air Programme (GCAP), a tri-nation initiative spearheaded by Italy, Japan and the United Kingdom to develop a sixth-generation fighter jet.

Włodzimierz Usarek, a retired major general of the Polish Air Force, told Defense News that by joining the Eurofighter’s supply chain alongside European partners, Poland’s defense industry could gain access to technologies and capacities that would otherwise not be available to local companies.

“Buying the Eurofighter will put Poland in a preferential position to develop the sixth-generation fighter and jointly produce it with other countries instead of continuing to be other countries’ client,” Usarek said. “With the F-35, we will have the stealth capacity that is necessary to open up the enemy airspace to other aircraft. With air superiority fighters such as the Eurofighter, Polish pilots will be able to fight the adversary at an altitude that only such aircraft can access.”

In a statement, Saab said that the contract’s value corresponds to around SEK 47 billion ($4.8 billion), and deliveries are scheduled to be completed during 2038. Saab has also committed to developing maintenance, repair, and overhaul (MRO) capabilities in Poland in close partnership with the country’s industry.

The deal was signed on June 29 in Gdynia, a city on the Polish Baltic Sea coast where a large part of the Navy’s fleet is stationed, in the presence of Poland’s and Sweden’s prime ministers and defense ministers.

Władysław Kosiniak-Kamysz, Poland’s deputy prime minister and national defense minister, who took part in the official signing ceremony, said that the new submarines will carry drone swarms that will be used to safeguard the nation’s critical infrastructure and shoreline.

“Poland is acquiring, under the deal that was signed a moment ago, three fifth-generation A26-type submarines. These are the most advanced submarines designed for operations in the Baltic Sea, capable of carrying out missions both for the Navy and for special operations forces,” Kosiniak-Kamysz was quoted as saying in a statement released by the ministry. “They will be able to deploy swarms of drones controlled from aboard the submarine and support the management and protection of the Baltic Sea’s security infrastructure and architecture.”

Under a separate deal, Poland aims to urgently acquire a “gap filler” boat for its Baltic Sea operations that will be used to train its sailors. Swedish submarine HMS Södermanland is to be procured for that role, according to officials.

The past months have brought a series of contracts that Warsaw has signed to modernize and expand the operational capabilities of the Navy which had traditionally been the most underinvested branch of the Polish military.

Most recently, the ministry awarded a deal to U.S. defense technology firm Shield AI to purchase its V-BAT drone for the naval forces.

Production activities at the facility, which will be capable of manufacturing 3,000 autonomous interceptors per month, are scheduled to begin this August, according to a senior company representative.

Balázs Nagy, the chief executive and co-founder of Tytan Technologies, told Defense News the company’s interceptor drones are extensively used in Ukraine where the nation’s military has employed them as a cost-efficient, effective and easy-to-use solution to counter airborne threats.

Legacy “systems couldn’t prove themselves in Ukraine. Bigger platforms have been destroyed with just very, very cheap drones. What we are doing at Tytan is we are making protecting the same airspace 200 times cheaper than with legacy systems,” Nagy said.

“And how we are doing that is by producing and developing autonomous counter-drone systems to neutralize enemy drones in the air,” he added. This is a major paradigm shift, going from very hard and expensive hardware to very simple and scalable hardware and very sophisticated software.”

Building on its interceptors’ use by a rising number of allies, including Germany and the Baltic States, Tytan Technologies is advancing projects to expand its manufacturing foothold into new markets, with Poland and Hungary named as potential locations for new factories.

“With the launch of our new, bigger German factory, we have a blueprint that we can use to scale up production in different regions,” Nagy said.

Tytan Technologies offers a range of autonomous interceptors which are powered by AI. These include: the EOS, a short-range multicopter interceptor developed to counter small drones categorized as NATO Class I unmanned threats; and the METIS, a long-range fixed-wing interceptor designed to neutralize NATO Class II drones, according to data from the company.

The development comes shortly after Prime Minister Donald Tusk announced the company has offered Poland a role in its X-BAT autonomous vertical-takeoff fighter jet program, including some of the manufacturing activities for the craft.

Shield AI said in a statement that the V-BAT will be deployed aboard a Polish Navy vessel, ensuring maritime domain awareness and intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (ISR) support to the force.

“V-BAT has proven its capabilities in Ukraine and beyond, particularly in environments where communications and GPS links are disrupted or denied,” Ryan Tseng, Shield AI’s president, co-founder and chief strategy officer, was quoted in the statement. “Operations in the Baltic Sea, where security threats against critical energy and communications infrastructure are becoming more frequent, demand reliable sensor platforms and systems in all-weather conditions and sea states.”

The Armament Agency, the Polish ministry’s procurement arm, said in a statement that “the delivery of the system, which comprises several platforms, is planned for later in 2026.”

The deal puts Poland in line to become the first country on NATO’s eastern flank to acquire the drone. Warsaw will join other operators, including Greece and the Netherlands, as well as the U.S. Navy and the Japan Maritime Self Defence Force, according to data from Shield AI.

“In addition to the aircraft themselves, the V-BAT system comes with ground control stations, antennas, spares, and maintenance equipment, and other operating equipment needed to maintain operational readiness,” a spokesperson for Shield AI told Defense News.

The spokesperson said that “Shield AI is actively pursuing partnerships with Polish industry to support future autonomy, aviation, and defense programs. We look forward to expanding our engagement with Poland and sharing additional details in the coming months.”

Since 2025, when Poland launched the Drone Force, its latest military component, the country has accelerated purchases of various classes of unmanned systems. Last month, the nation also joined the Pentagon’s counter-drone initiative to gain access to a marketplace that connects partner countries with emerging technology suppliers.

“Their intention is to also cooperate with Poland, and to produce in Poland, for the X-BAT program, the first autonomous combat aircraft in the world,” Tusk said at a June 16 press conference in Warsaw. “It’s top-tier technology, a chance for air domination in case of an armed conflict, and an incredibly ambitious project with regard to technology and innovativeness.”

Shield AI unveiled the X-BAT in October 2025, promoting its artificial intelligence-driven unmanned fighter capable of vertical takeoffs and landings as a platform suitable for expeditionary and maritime operations in contested environments.

“At the core of X-BAT is Shield AI’s Hivemind, AI-enabled autonomy software designed to fly platforms in communications-denied, degraded, and limited environments,” the company said in a statement. “Hivemind enables X-BAT to autonomously penetrate contested battlespace, dynamically team with manned aircraft, and execute collaborative tactics without constant communications. This autonomy allows X-BAT to function as a drone wingman or as a standalone asset.”

The latest announcement comes as the Polish government is mulling plans to acquire up to 32 new fighter jets, with some of the evaluated options including: Lockheed Martin’s F-35; the Eurofighter Typhoon, a jet produced by a consortium of Airbus, BAE Systems and Leonardo; and Boeing’s F-15EX.

At the same time, Warsaw is also considering to join the Global Combat Air Programme (GCAP) and involve the country’s defense sector in the project to develop a sixth-generation fighter jet. The Polish government is evaluating whether engaging its state-dominated defense industry in the tri-nation initiative, which is spearheaded by Italy, Japan and the United Kingdom, could boost the sector’s capacities and innovativeness, according to Polish Deputy State Assets Minister Konrad Gołota.

Set up in 2015, Shield AI is a venture-backed defense tech company. In addition to X-BAT and Hivemind, its other products include the V-BAT drone.