The Drone War No One Can Stop: Mystery Aircraft Defy Europe’s Defences
Written by Christopher Sharp - 3 November 2025
Last weekend in Belgium, drones were sighted above Kleine Brogel Air Base, a site hosting F-16s and U.S. nuclear weapons.
Belgian Defence Minister Theo Francken reported the first phase involved “small drones to test radio frequencies”; the second phase involved “big drones to destabilise the area and people”. Jamming efforts failed because the drones reportedly switched frequencies; military used no kinetic force citing risk to civilians.
Similar incidents have occurred at U.S. bases: Langley Air Force Base (Virginia) in December 2023 and RAF Lakenheath (UK) in November 2024. An internal USAF/FBI/NASA report found an “over-reliance” on radio frequency-based detection and signal-jamming systems that failed.
In September, French forces boarded a Russian-linked tanker after the European incursions; however, Emmanuel Macron stated no clear link between the tanker and the drone incidents could be established.
German authorities at Berlin Brandenburg Airport (31 Oct 2025) and in the Ruhland region (18 Oct 2025) documented formations of multiple drones flying in grid-like patterns.
FBI documents released by journalist Ross Coulthart show that UAP (Unidentified Anomalous Phenomena) have been classified as UxS (uncrewed systems) — implying military-grade drone/robotic origins. This raises the possibility that drones may be of extraordinary origin, given their ability to adapt, evade countermeasures, and operate over sensitive national-security sites.
Unidentified drones are buzzing around military bases across Europe.
In September 2025, a wave of incursions caused major disruption.
Copenhagen Airport was temporarily closed.
Danish military bases were breached.
Drones were also spotted over a power plant, a hospital, and a ThyssenKrupp naval factory in Germany.
France and Belgium were affected too.
The countries hit seemed powerless to stop the drones.
On Saturday (1 November) and Sunday (2 November), drones were sighted on two separate occasions over Kleine Brogel Air Base in Belgium.
The base hosts F-16s from the Belgian Air Force’s 10th Tactical Wing.
Alarmingly, under NATO’s nuclear sharing program, the base also stores B61-series nuclear bombs.
Belgian Defence Minister Theo Francken confirmed that drones entered the area near the Base in northeastern Belgium on Saturday and Sunday nights in two separate phases.
Francken said the first phase involved “small drones to test the radio frequencies” of Belgian security services. Later, “big drones” appeared, apparently “to destabilize the area and people,” he told public broadcaster RTBF.
“It resembles a spy operation. By whom, I don’t know,” he said. “I have a few ideas, but I’m going to be careful about speculating.”
As in September, Belgian forces appeared unable to bring down the drones. Francken later explained why jamming efforts failed and why the military chose not to use kinetic force.
Francken said the security services’ jammer failed because the drones had adapted.
“The jammer didn’t work because they tested our radio frequency and changed it,” he explained. “They have their own frequencies. An amateur doesn’t know how to do that.”
When asked why the drones weren’t shot down, Francken said:
“If they’re over a military base, we can shoot them down. But if they’re nearby, we have to be very careful — they could fall on a house, a car, a person. That’s completely different.”
He added that the situation also raised legal questions. “It’s not entirely clear. We have to clarify the legal grounds.”
Francken admitted that Belgium was still playing catch-up.
“We’re chasing after the threat,” he said. “We should have bought air defense systems five or ten years ago.”
Similar failures exposing the limits of counter-drone technology have occurred in recent years, affecting key U.S. military bases.
In December 2023, Langley Air Force Base in Virginia was swarmed by dozens of drones over several weeks, sparking a major security scare.
In 2024, Liberation Times obtained twenty-two witness statements and an incident report through a Freedom of Information Act request, following incursions at the base.
These statements come from members of the 633d Security Forces Squadron, who are responsible for guarding Joint Base Langley-Eustis.
Witnesses from the 633d Security Forces Squadron reported observing the so-called ‘drones’ ‘moving at rapid speeds’ and displaying ‘flashing red, green, and white lights’.
Concerningly, one witness stated that their dronebuster ‘failed to register’ one of the objects, while another was unable to use a dronebuster ‘due to not having a visual’.
An internal report by the U.S. Air Force, FBI, and NASA — which also has facilities in the area affected by the incursions — found that there was ‘over-reliance on RF [radio frequency]-based detection equipment (failed)’ and ‘over-reliance on signal-jamming mitigation technology (failed).’
In November 2024, RAF Lakenheath, a UK base operated by the U.S. Air Force, was impacted by similar incursions
A UK military source told the Daily Mail that the drones appeared to be controlled remotely using radio frequencies outside of the normal bands used for military or civilian drones.
'The drones were flying in with no lights. When they were close to the site, they were turning on the lights going, "Here I am," and as far as I know not one piece of our equipment could bring it down or spot it,' the source commented.
The source added, 'We ended up using some Special Forces equipment, and nothing actually worked, to my knowledge. Nothing ever suggested to me we knew what we were doing, or what we were dealing with.’
The pattern is clear — from mainland Europe to RAF Lakenheath and Langley Air Force Base. Jamming has failed.
While the failure of jamming could potentially be explained in some instances by the ‘unjammable’ fibre-optic technology employed by Russia in Ukraine, although they are tethered to their operator, the inability to identify the controllers cannot, nor can the drones’ brazen behaviour, which risks a diplomatic crisis if one were to malfunction or be brought down and recovered.
The drones fly openly, lights flashing in defiance. No one knows who sent them - at least in the unclassified world.
Not a single origin, not a single controller, has been established yet.
Following a wave of drone incursions over Denmark and other European countries in September, French forces boarded a Russian-linked oil tanker from the so-called shadow fleet, suspected of possible involvement. The vessel was later allowed to continue its journey.
When asked whether a connection could be established between the tanker and the drone activity, French President Emmanuel Macron said:
“I don’t exclude it at all, but I cannot at this stage clearly attribute and establish a link between these two phenomena.”
In Germany, continued incursions have triggered fresh alarm. At Berlin Brandenburg Airport on 31 October 2025, flights were suspended for nearly two hours after an unidentified drone breached airport airspace.
Meanwhile, in the region of Ruhland, local authorities documented multiple drone sightings on the weekend of 18 October 2025, with reports describing what looked like up to ten drones flying side-by-side in formation.
Amtsdirektor (local administrative head) Christian Konzack said, “It looked as if they were flying over a grid.”
Intriguingly, FBI documents released by investigative journalist Ross Coulthart revealed that Unidentified Anomalous Phenomena (UAP) had been classified as a form of UxS — shorthand for ‘uncrewed systems,’ a military term covering drones, autonomous aircraft, and other remotely operated vehicles.
If accurate, this would suggest that the drones intruding on civilian and military infrastructure may have an extraordinary origin — one that could explain their sophisticated ability to evade jamming efforts.
Since the earliest reports of UAP — formerly known as UFOs or flying saucers — witnesses have often claimed they can disguise themselves as ordinary objects, such as balloons.
Jean Kisling, serving with the United States Air Force, was the first person to fire on UFOs, despite initially believing them to be balloons, in 1945.
He later recalled:
"At that time, the skies over the state of Michigan were regularly crossed by balloons of unknown origin. The trauma of Pearl Harbour was still being very fresh in the minds of Americans, they were considered by many to be observation and espionage devices from Japan.
“At the request of the commander of Selfridge Air Force Base, and in the absence of other candidates, given the tragic outcomes of some recent attempts, I volunteered to intercept the balloons and took off immediately.
“Aboard my P-47, despite climbing to reach my target, the distance between my aircraft and the balloons remained surprisingly unchanged! Having reached nearly 55,000 feet, and despite the difficulties of piloting—the cold and the altitude—I managed to unleash a long burst from my eight 12.7 mm machine guns toward the balloons.
“To my great surprise, the balloons transformed into flying saucers, moved away, and disappeared at an exceptional speed, leaving behind trails similar to those of high-altitude jet aircraft.”
In January 2025, Matthew Livelsberger, an active-duty U.S. Special Forces operator, detonated his Tesla Cybertruck outside the Trump International Hotel.
In a manifesto published after his death, Livelsberger alleged that the drones sighted along the U.S. eastern seaboard in late 2024 were powered by gravitic propulsion systems — advanced aerospace technology he claimed was already in operational use by both the United States and China.
He further asserted that Chinese submarines had deployed these craft along the Atlantic coast as part of a long-term surveillance campaign.
His warning was stark:
“They are the most dangerous threat to national security that has ever existed. They basically have an unlimited payload capacity and can park it over the WH [White House] if they wanted. It’s checkmate.”
Whatever these drones turn out to be, the inability to trace or intercept them carries dangerous implications — particularly when they appear over nuclear weapons sites such as Kleine Brogel Air Base in Belgium.
