Garisons: Drones have changed warfare, but NATO is adapting too slowly

Unmanned aircraft and robotics have irreversibly changed modern warfare, yet NATO, the North Atlantic military alliance, is still experimenting and is slow to adopt these changes. That was the assessment of Jānis Garisons, chairman of the board of water-drone manufacturer Newt21, on the TV24 programme “Kārtības rullis”, where Latvia's security and defence readiness was discussed in October 2026. Raimonds Bergmanis, chair of the Latvian parliament's (Saeima) Defence, Internal Affairs and Corruption Prevention Committee, agreed.

Criticism of the NATO commander's remarks

Garisons was critical of recent remarks by NATO's top commander, calling them a reflection of the old model of warfare. In his view, Latvia is currently a step ahead of NATO's overall pace in understanding these technologies, but that is not enough.

He warned that if the alliance waits for an adversary to attack, it must expect that all large radars, ships and other military infrastructure will be destroyed by drones. As an example he cited Ukraine, where a 30-kilometre “kill zone” has been created that no one can enter. According to Garisons, drones in air defence have created a new level that cannot be fought against.

Garisons is convinced there is no way back to the old order and that the new technologies are here to stay. He asked rhetorically where the drone units are, and welcomed Germany's recent announcement that it will create specialised drone units.

Bergmanis: speed up unit creation

Bergmanis noted that both Russia and Ukraine have already set up separate robot and drone commands. He stressed that Latvia and its allies must now do their utmost to speed up the creation of such units and introduce them across NATO's defence system.