UFORCE, a Ukrainian defense company, says it fielded 11 crewless boats and eight drones at NATO's largest unmanned-systems exercise in Portugal, Militarnyi reported. The firm's crews acted as both mock enemy and allied forces alongside Ukraine's Navy during the 31 August–25 September drills. The turnout more than doubled the company's presence at last year's exercise, when it brought five vessels.

Ukraine began the all-out war without large warships, yet uncrewed boats drove Russia's Black Sea Fleet out of its main base on the Black Sea—a result that now pulls far larger navies to the same ranges to test the weapon for themselves.

Ukraine brings its sea-drone playbook to Portugal's NATO exercise

UFORCE joined REPMUS 26, the Portuguese Navy's annual exercise, co-organized with NATO, where member states try out robots and drones built for combat at sea. This year the company widened its presence sharply, UFORCE said on LinkedIn. Across the scenarios, its crews ran strikes, reconnaissance, and defense.

At the center sat the MV7, an uncrewed boat UFORCE showed in every setup it offers. Across its configurations, the MV7 carried interceptors, FPV drones, other kinetic weapons, and electronic-warfare gear. Crews launched flying drones straight off the decks while the boats sat on the water, all run by a single control program.

The company brought three systems to REPMUS for the first time: the Nemesis SeaStrike drone, which launches from the MV7, the MV11 boat, and a supply vessel called L11. UFORCE teams worked beside Ukraine's Navy throughout. Portuguese President António José Seguro inspected the MV7 on the pier, the company said.

Not Ukraine's first visit

Ukraine was at REPMUS last year, too. At REPMUS 2025, a Ukrainian-led "enemy" team beat NATO's side across all five drill scenarios and, in one, landed enough mock strikes on a NATO frigate to have sunk it in a real battle. Ukraine also brought the upgraded Magura v7.2 to that year's drills.

All 32 NATO member states are on track to meet the alliance's 2% GDP defense spending benchmark in 2025, Secretary General Mark Rutte said on June 17 at the G7 summit in Canada.

The announcement marks a major shift for the alliance, which has faced repeated criticism from U.S. President Donald Trump for failing to meet spending commitments.

The U.S. president has long pushed NATO members to spend more on defense, at one point suggesting the threshold be raised to 5% of GDP.

"This is really great news," Rutte said, praising announcements from Canada and Portugal, the last two holdouts. "The fact that you decided to bring Canada to the 2% spending when it comes to NATO this year is really fantastic," he told Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney.

In 2024, only 23 alliance members met the 2% target, according to NATO estimates. Poland led all members with 4.12% of GDP allocated to defense, followed by Estonia (3.43%) and the U.S. (3.38%).

Rutte's comments come ahead of the June 24–25 NATO summit in The Hague, which has been reportedly scaled back to a single working session on defense spending and alliance capabilities.

The move, according to Italian outlet ANSA, is designed to avoid friction with Trump, whose presence at the summit remains unconfirmed.

Ukraine has been invited to the summit, but President Volodymyr Zelensky may reconsider his attendance amid uncertainty over the U.S. delegation, the Guardian reported on June 17.

According to the outlet, some in Kyiv are questioning whether Zelensky's presence at the summit would be worthwhile without a confirmed meeting with Trump.

Many NATO members have cited Russia's ongoing war against Ukraine and Trump's isolationist rhetoric as reasons to accelerate defense spending and prepare for potential future threats.

Ukraine won’t receive NATO invitation at The Hague summit, Lithuanian FM says

“This issue is certainly not on the NATO agenda and nobody has formulated an expectation that there will be an invitation in The Hague, nor have we heard that from the Ukrainians themselves,” Lithuanian Foreign Minister Kestutis Budrys said in comments quoted by the LRT broadcaster.

The Kyiv IndependentMartin Fornusek