It’s an unforced error that will be keenly felt in Moscow, whose high ambitions for producing its own drones have been slow to take flight.Given shortfalls in manpower, munitions, artillery, and aircraft, Russia has signaled its belief that uncrewed systems could be transformative in an attritional war, listing drone production among the Kremlin’s priority projects. Russian President Vladimir Putin has also announced plans to increase drone production tenfold in 2024, aiming to manufacture 1.4 million this year.But is this realistic or just more propaganda?Russia will struggle to meet this target and will likely have to rely on China to procure enough drones. To supply this demand, China would need to significantly boost its own production.Opinion: Ukraine’s war is the reckoning with empire Europe can no longer avoidThirty years ago, in a Ukrainian churchyard where my Russian ancestors are buried, I knelt beside a very old woman leaning on a stick, her hair covered in a black kerchief.