Romania already owned its first unmanned aerial vehicles in 1987. The Soviet-designed VR-3 unmanned aircraft was capable of performing reconnaissance missions with an action radius of 200 kilometers. The 12 Romanian VR-3’s were dismantled in 2000 after being replaced by 11 US-build Shadow 600 drone in 1999, which saw use in several international operations. Apart from intelligence, reconnaissance and surveillance, Romania also imported a French-made drone for target practice, as well as producing one locally.
Various indigenous projects were started to develop drones, but many did not manage to achieve the prototype or demonstrator-stage. The Romanian Cosmonautics and Aeronautics Association (ARCA) has developed an electric medium-sized UAV called the AirStrato, which could carry surveillance equipment. Equipped with solar panels, this electric UAV could reportedly fly for three days straight, though it is unclear what weight it could carry in that set-up. The technical capacity is seemingly present, but little financial support and interest from Romanian authorities appears to have hampered the development of a lively domestic military drone industry. One exception to this is the Hirrus UAV, an ISTAR drone capable of following objects autonomously, with a flight time of 3 hours and a pricetag of about 100.000 euros. The Hirrus was developed with the help of the Politehnica University of Bucharest, and saw use during NATO’s 2016 Unified Vision exercise.
Apart from these domestic efforts, Romania has also looked across its borders for the acquisition of drone-capability. In 2016, Romania’s military forces acquired four ‘Phoenix 30‘ military quadcopter drones from the US. Romania is also part of NATO’s Alliance Ground Surveillance system, meaning it has acquired five Global Hawk drones together with 14 other NATO members. Lastly, Romania is part of the European MALE RPAS User Community, which examines options to pool and share UAV capability, as well as sharing information, training, and expertise on how to operate such drones.
In August 2018, DefenseNews reported that the US might soon be stationing MQ-9 Reaper drones at an airbase near Campia Turzii. A hangar was being constructed there which met “all the security requirements” involved with hosting the drones. The Reapers would likely be used for intelligence gathering purposes in Eastern-Europe and the Black Sea, though not above Ukraine due to the lack of defensive capabilities of such drones.
There has been no sign of a lively debate on the role which drones can and can not play during military operations. This is worrying, considering the fact that Romania might soon start hosting US drones.
Romania, though member of NATO, is not part of the “14 Eyes” intelligence-sharing coalition. The drones which are likely to be stationed near Campia Turzii will likely be unarmed and hence not used for targeted killings. Both these factors will likely prevent Romania from becoming complicit in illegal targeted killings carried out by armed drones.
Interest in exporting drones build in Romania appears to be non-existant. However, there is interest in the acquisition of drones, possibly complicating Romania’s willigness to curb the proliferation of drones.