Ukraine's weapons marketplace DOT-Chain Defense has compressed delivery times from months to weeks after one year of operation, the country's Defense Ministry reported. For the fastest product categories—electronic warfare gear, ground robots, interceptor drones—orders now reach units within 24 hours.

Ukraine's war against Russia's invasion has pushed Kyiv to rebuild military procurement from the ground up, trading slow bureaucratic pipelines for digital platforms where frontline units pick and receive their own weapons faster than Western militaries have managed. Domestic manufacturers now make 90% of newly authorized systems.

Fastest deliveries measured in hours

The Defense Ministry and the Defense Procurement Agency DOT have jointly driven the acceleration, according to the ministry's statement.

"Delivery times for drones and other systems have shrunk from months to a matter of weeks, and often to days," the ministry said.

Beyond that general compression, several categories saw delivery within a single day. Electronic warfare systems, ground robotic platforms, reconnaissance and bomber drones, interceptor drones, and FPV drones on both fiber-optic and radio control all reached units within 24 hours. Ammunition for unmanned systems arrived within six days.

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Over the first year, the platform shipped more than 1.2 million drones and other systems. Units now choose from 1,181 products made by 300 domestic manufacturers.

How the marketplace works

DOT-Chain Defense supplements centralized state supply rather than replacing it, the ministry noted. Combat units use allocated funds to browse and order the equipment they need for their section of the front. The marketplace handles contracts, payments, and delivery.

The platform's drone constructor tool lets units customize drone configurations before ordering. A dedicated training course on using the marketplace recently launched inside the Army+ mobile app.

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Broader procurement picture

The one-year milestone caps a period of rapid scaling across Ukraine's defense procurement. The country contracted about $8 billion worth of drones in the first half of 2026—double the same period last year, according to the Defense Ministry.

More than 400 combat units now shop for weapons through the marketplace's companion Brave1 Market program using points earned for confirmed battlefield activity. Washington modeled its own Unmanned Aircraft Systems Marketplace on the Ukrainian original earlier this year.

Ukraine has knocked out seven of the 10 largest logistics hubs run by Russia's biggest online retailer, the US-based Institute for the Study of War assessed. The strikes are part of a campaign to wear down Russia's defense industry and the dual-use supply lines that feed its war. The newest raids hit two warehouses near Moscow overnight.

Two hubs near Moscow burned overnight

On 15-16 August, Ukrainian drones struck Wildberries' single largest hub, a 250,000-square-meter depot in the Koledino Industrial Park in Podolsk, Moscow Oblast. Ukraine's Defense Ministry reported the hit, about 420 kilometers from the border.

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Wildberries confirmed the fire and said it had to reorganize its supply chains. Moscow Oblast Governor Andrei Vorobyov acknowledged the strike, and geolocated footage showed the depot ablaze.

Drones also hit a second warehouse the same night, in Domodedovo, roughly 430 kilometers from the border. Footage showed a fire at the Severnoye Domodedovo complex.

Why the warehouses are targets

Ukrainian officials say Wildberries helps supply the Russian military, moving drone components and navigation gear. Kyiv folded the retailer into a deep-strike campaign that began in mid-July.

The company is Russia's answer to Amazon, its largest online marketplace. Its sprawling depots make broad, hard-to-defend targets.

The damage keeps growing

By early August, the strikes had destroyed at least 1.18 million square meters of Wildberries storage, about a fifth of its capacity, ISW noted. The toll has climbed since.

The losses ripple outward to independent sellers who rent space in the hubs. Many have watched their stock burn with no compensation.

Ukraine's Unmanned Systems Forces (USF) announced on June 20 the establishment of a new command group that will unite the branch with other top drone units in the country's military.

Drones have become one of the defining tools of the full-scale war, used extensively by both Ukraine and Russia for surveillance, long-range strikes, and tactical battlefield firepower.

The new formation will unite all military units of the USF with the Drone Line, a project launched by President Volodymyr Zelensky in February this year to coordinate and expand five of the country's strongest drone units.

The new command umbrella was created to "improve the efficiency of management, transform the Forces, and adapt to the requirements of modern warfare," according to the statement.

The units will operate within a single chain of command, with a defined structure and a common vision of unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) tactics in order to harmonize approaches, establish joint work, and use unmanned systems more effectively in combat, the USF said.

The Unmanned Systems Forces were created as a separate branch of Ukraine's military in June 2024.

At that time, Ukraine's strongest existing drone units served in other branches of the defense forces, including the Ground Forces, National Guard, and the Security Service of Ukraine.

The newly-created group will be led by Major Robert Brovdi, better known by his callsign Magyar, whom Zelensky appointed as the commander of the USF in early June.

Brovdi had previously served as commander of the eponymous Magyar's Birds Unmanned Systems Brigade, a founding member of the Drone Line initiative and one of the most consistently high-performing drone units in the Ukrainian military.

A world-first phenomenon, Ukraine's Unmanned Systems Forces works to improve the country's drone operations, creating drone-specific units, ramping up training, increasing drone production, and advancing innovation.

The USF has also carried out hundreds of operations deep within Russian territory.

Following in Ukraine's footsteps, Russian President Vladimir Putin announced the creation of his country's own individual drone branch on June 12.

Colonel Vadym Sukharevskyi, previously deputy commander-in-chief of Ukraine's Armed Forces, was named the first commander of the USF on June 10, 2024.

Brovdi replaced Sukharevskyi, who was dismissed on June 3.

According to military personnel who spoke anonymously to Ukrainian news outlet Suspilne, Sukharevskyi's relationship with Commander-in-Chief Oleksandr Syrskyi was tense from the beginning of the USF's formation.

Sukharevskyi's appointment was a decision by president Zelensky, not Syrskyi, sources said.

People close to both Syrskyi and Sukharevskyi also claimed the two men avoided face-to-face interactions.

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Ukraine's 59th Brigade of the Unmanned Systems Forces said on June 17 that former fighter Ryan O'Leary no longer has access to current information about the unit's operations and cannot speak on its behalf.

The statement follows public criticism from O'Leary, an American volunteer and former commander of the Chosen Company, who alleged widespread leadership failures within Ukraine's Armed Forces.

On June 14, O'Leary said mismanagement within the military, rather than Russia's action, was responsible for "more deaths," accusing commanders of prioritizing personal power over troop welfare.

"The officer corps behaves like a caste system of untouchables or 'army lords,'" he wrote on X.

Chosen Company, originally formed as the 312 Swedish Volunteer Company at the start of Russia's full-scale invasion in 2022, has drawn members from more than 31 countries.

Its first commander, Swedish veteran Edvard Selander Patrignani, was killed in action in July 2022. O'Leary took command afterward, and the unit was integrated into the 59th Brigade in early 2023.

O'Leary accused the former commander of the 59th Brigade, Lieutenant Colonel Bohdan Shevchuk, of sending intelligence officers into reckless assaults, resulting in avoidable casualties. Shevchuk was recently removed from command after being accused of submitting false reports.

"In the first two months of his command, he sent soldiers into unattainable positions with no hope of reinforcement or survival," O'Leary claimed.

In response, the 59th Brigade, deployed in the Pokrovsk sector in Donetsk Oblast, said O'Leary voluntarily resigned from service on Feb. 8, 2024, and has not taken part in any operations or internal decisions since.

"He does not have up-to-date information on the state of affairs in the unit and cannot comment on it," the brigade said. "The dissemination of unfounded accusations and misinformation undermines morale and negatively affects the unit's combat readiness."

The 59th Brigade emphasized that its soldiers continue to perform combat missions under challenging conditions and "maintain high efficiency and effectiveness."

O'Leary had announced the disbandment of the Chosen Company on May 26, but said he would wait to discuss details until his contract officially ended.

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