Power is being monopolised in Ukraine

Behind the nondescript façade of a light-industrial building in Kyiv, an eclectic crew of video-gamers, architects, scientists and film-makers is mass-producing deep-strike drones and cruise missiles. They do not look like old-style defence types, but they are transforming Ukraine’s war. Three years ago they were making 30 drones a month. Now they are up to 1,300 a month, ranging from slow drones ($580,000 for a set of ten) to a new ballistic missile (at $1m a piece). They cost a fraction of what foreign ones do, and are based on open-source designs, meaning that they are not bound by foreign-usage restrictions. “We don’t want to have any dependence on America’s politics,” says the firm’s founder, whose name cannot be disclosed for security reasons.