"What's different? After the mass drone incident in Poland — when Russian drones flew over Poland about a month ago — there have now been such service-disruption attacks using drones in ten different countries. If we're used to talking about, say, DDoS attacks in cyberspace, this is essentially the same kind of denial-of-service attack directed at a critical service, using cheap, readily available means. And the fact that it's a wider operation is signaled by reports of such incidents coming from ten European countries," Oidsalu said.

"This is an asymmetric weapon, because, as Estonian experts have already explained in the media, detecting and taking down drones in flight is very difficult and any use of force there can lead to civilian casualties," he added.

"Right now we are at a stage where Europe as a whole is two to three years behind Ukraine in the development of counter-drone capabilities. We have started some initiatives here. At Estonia's initiative, the European Union's 'drone wall' project was set up. But all those things take time. We missed a head start that could have been given to us by what's happening on Ukraine's battlefields. Why didn't we take that into account? Maybe the general perception of risk was that the war wouldn't dangerously move beyond Ukraine. We thought of it as a possible military spillover, but the Russians also have other means of escalation, including hybrid methods; they have experience in that area," Oidsalu said.

"We should now draw sober conclusions and put together a rapid implementation plan to not only improve drone defenses but also, in terms of offensive drone capabilities, to at least partially catch up with the adversary," Oidsalu said.

The expert said the drones are likely being launched from Russian shadow fleet vessels.

"If it's assumed that shadow ships are being used to launch drones, then why isn't maritime surveillance able to detect that? Maybe we aren't conducting sufficient sea surveillance and should think about how to act in this new situation — which isn't actually all that new, because these vessels have been loitering in the Baltic Sea for years. There is certainly room for improvement there, together with our allies," Oidsalu said.

NATO has come

According to Oidsalu, NATO has stepped in after several incidents and launched operations, such as Baltic Sentry, which was initiated after shadow fleet vessels damaged undersea cables.

"We shouldn't feel that NATO isn't helping us. As part of Baltic Sentry, maritime surveillance has been significantly strengthened, as has presence. Even the Americans sent their maritime patrol aircraft, which is capable of surveillance, reconnaissance and simultaneously engaging both submarines and surface vessels. There has definitely been more activity there, including in the form of exercises. Poland and Sweden held a large exercise on Gotland and Sweden has previously used exercises to bolster the island's security. Certain security activities are clearly underway. I think, within a broader conceptual framework, this is part of that same operation," Oidsalu said.

"Now, in the air, NATO has launched Operation Eastern Sentry and aerial presence has grown quite massive. NATO is clearly showing it is here and in fact is present in order to better understand what's happening in the airspace. They are also looking at the pattern of these isolated drone incidents — how wide they are geographically — and then likely assessing the risk scenarios as well, including at NATO command, in terms of whether further escalation will come at some point. Maybe not in this same domain, maybe not with drones, but something else may happen. NATO wants to send a strong signal to the Russians that we are here and we are not afraid to act for self-defense," he added.

About a week ago, U.S. President Donald Trump unexpectedly said Ukraine could take back all of its territory and that Russia's economy is headed for collapse. This week, the U.S. administration is already discussing supplying Ukraine with long-range missiles. Oidsalu said he could not say exactly what was behind Trump's sudden shift.

"I regularly talk with Estonian diplomats and they admit honestly that they don't know either what exactly is happening in the White House or how to interpret it. But that's inevitable and says something about the openness of the Trump administration — there's simply no good information," Oidsalu said.

He speculated that perhaps Trump heard something from Volodymyr Zelenskyy that gave him hope for Ukraine's full liberation. "Maybe the picture Ukrainians painted for Trump was something like this: all right, the Russians are escalating now, and since the Alaska summit between Trump and Putin, the front-line statistics in some domains have gotten quite grim, but in fact Russia is on the brink of exhaustion and there's a possibility of a collapse that would allow Ukraine to take back its territory. That's one way of trying to imagine the thought process across the Atlantic from here," Oidsalu said.

He added that Europe should not limit itself to speaking only about peace. "If such an unprecedented statement has been made about taking back territory, then we should not remain stuck in the peace mantra, which I feel we in Europe don't fully believe ourselves and maybe only repeat in hopes that Trump will pick up the phone on European issues," the expert said.

"Something has shifted and I think that in the end even Donald Trump realizes when he is being played. If he is promised dialogue, but then escalation happens in Ukraine, he understands that," Oidsalu said.

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