Ukraine's €58,000 'Lima' jammer claims 20,000+ Shaheds spoofed off course
Networked EW — Lima, Pokrova, Bukovel — becomes a cheap layer against saturation drone strikes
Summary
As Russia's Geran strikes hit record volume, Ukraine is leaning on cheap, networked Electronic Warfare as a defeat layer it can afford at scale. Its "Lima" system — about €58,000 a unit — has, developers say, disrupted 20,000+ Shahed Drones and dozens of missiles by jamming and spoofing GPS/GLONASS guidance so they veer off course, rather than shooting them down. Wider-area systems follow: Pokrova corrupts satellite-navigation coordinates across regions, and Bukovel-AD detects UAVs to ~100km and jams to 15–20km. Kyiv calls the networked approach an EW "wall". The catch is the counter-move both sides have already made: fibre-optic Fpv Drones fly with no radio link, so no jammer touches them — the same gap Hezbollah is exploiting against Israel. EW buys volume defence cheaply, but only against the radio-guided threat.
By the numbers
- ~€58,000 — cost of one Lima EW unit.
- 20,000+ — Shahed drones Lima's developers say it has spoofed/disrupted.
- ~100km — Bukovel-AD UAV detection range; 15–20km jamming range.
- 30–50% — fibre-optic share of FPVs in some front-line units — immune to all of this.
Why it matters
EW is the only counter-drone layer with economics that survive a 4,000-drone month: a €58,000 jammer can deflect many strikes for the cost of one missile. But fibre-optic FPVs nullify it, forcing armies to run EW and kinetic/net defences in parallel — and shaping the EW arms race NATO is now studying for its own eastern flank.
What to watch
- Russian adaptation: frequency-hopping, inertial/optical navigation, more fibre-optic FPVs.
- Whether Pokrova-style wide-area spoofing scales without disrupting civilian GNSS.
- NATO procurement of Ukraine-proven EW for its eastern flank and the High North.