Ukraine’s Dr. Strangelove - The Atlantic

Nations don’t always get to pick their heroes, especially not in a time of war. Most Ukrainians, given the choice, would probably not want a character like Denys Shtilerman to be the architect of their revenge against Russia. He studied in Russia, became wealthy in Russia, worked for a Russian military institute, and served two stints in Russian jails. Some of his close associates are wanted in Ukraine for corruption. Yet Shtilerman, a prolific designer of weapons, has earned admiration across Europe for his role in Ukraine’s defense.<br>His company, Fire Point, produces the bulk of the long-range drones that Ukraine has used to bring the war to Russian soil. Scores of them roll off the company’s production lines each day to be launched into Russia by night. Its missiles reach as far as Siberia, more than 1,000 miles away. The campaign of strikes, mostly targeting oil refineries and other energy infrastructure, has humiliated the Kremlin, snarled the logistics of its military, and forced many millions of Russians to suffer through rampant shortages of fuel.<br>For the first time in years, Ukraine appears to have Russia on the ropes, and no supplier of weapons, foreign or domestic, is doing more than Shtilerman to keep it there. His ambitions go far beyond Ukraine. In several interviews this year in Kyiv, he told me about his plans to change the global balance of power by developing cheap and effective missile technology. Above all, he wants to help Europe build its own missile-defense shield without relying on the United States. “What’s horrible is that America, even before Trump, was a completely unreliable partner and ally,” Shtilerman said this winter during a tour of his missile factory near Kyiv. “We want to be independent of all suppliers, especially the Americans.”<br>At a gathering on Monday in Paris, the leaders of nine European countries formalized their plans to build such a system alongside Ukraine: Denmark, France, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Norway, Spain, Sweden, and the United Kingdom, all members of the NATO alliance. In announcing what they called their Integrated Anti-Ballistic Missile Coalition, these nations said in a joint statement: “We acknowledge the unique experience of Ukraine, gained in defence against Russia’s war of aggression.” Ukraine, they said, would be a founding partner in the missile shield.<br>Shtilerman has spent more than a year laying the ground for this system; he prefers to use its code name, Project Freyja, after the Norse goddess of beauty, love, death, and war. In February, he showed me the missile, known as the FP-7x, developed to serve as the basis for Freyja. “This is what the very autonomy we’ve been talking about for years looks like,” Shtilerman wrote in response to Monday’s announcement in Paris. “It’s not America that decides whether Europe can defend itself. Europe is building its own shield.”<br>The project illustrates how Europe has reacted to President Trump’s threats against NATO, such as his desire to seize Greenland and annex Canada. Denmark, which has faced the most aggressive rhetoric from Trump of any NATO member, has also been the most intent on working with Ukraine and, in particular, with Fire Point. But it’s not alone. By developing their own arms industries and forming new defensive coalitions, many European states have sought to ease their reliance on the U.S. for their security. The shift has made Ukraine a valued partner.<br>Read: ‘We are learning to bully back’<br>It has also marked a dramatic reversal of fortunes for Shtilerman. Earlier this year, his company got mixed up in one of the worst corruption scandals in Ukraine’s recent history. Shtilerman has not been accused of breaking the law, but anti-corruption investigators are reviewing some of his contracts with the military. Amid the scrutiny, Shtilerman has continued signing production deals and joint ventures with European defense firms, which seem undeterred by all of the controversies.<br>Some of the points on Shtilerman’s résumé, in particular his ties to Russia, would be enough to tank the career of another Ukrainian businessman. He told me, for example, that he worked in the early 2000s for the Moscow defense institute that produces Vladimir Putin’s “little nuclear suitcase,” which the Russian president would use in a crisis to authorize the use of nuclear weapons. When I asked Shtilerman why he would share this information with a journalist, he shrugged and said that, given his role in the missile industry, all of his secrets would come out eventually. It would be better, he said, for the public to get the dirt from him and not from Russian leaks and character assassins.<br>In that sense, his disclosures could give him some immunity from further scandal. But he also seems to believe that his success has made him indispensable, not only to Ukraine but also to the rest of Europe. “We have a chance right now, working together, to gain our independence from...