Vučić opens an Israeli drone assembly plant and promises three more

Aleksandar Vučić said on Thursday that Serbia has opened a factory to assemble Israeli-designed drones for its own armed forces and for other armies. He put the workforce at about 100 and said at least three more plants with Israeli partners are planned.

He did not name the site or the Israeli company. Journalists were barred because of what he called the confidentiality of the production process. An Instagram video showed him touring the floor with Israeli Ambassador Avivit Bar-Ilan, inspecting a drone and briefly flying one. "They go through the windows and chase the opponent, they are incredibly efficient," he said. Warheads, he added, will be produced at the Krušik plant.

The names he did not use

Vučić announced a combat-drone deal with Israel in April. BIRN reported that month that state arms exporter Yugoimport SDPR would open a plant with Elbit Systems. Haaretz has carried the same pairing. Neither Vučić nor Elbit confirmed that identity at Thursday's opening. The public record still points there unless a different Israeli firm steps forward.

Elbit is a major Israeli defence contractor. Its systems are used by the Israeli military. That fact is why the factory is a political object in Belgrade as well as a production line. Serbia has tried to keep lines open to both Moscow and Western capitals. An assembly plant for Israeli combat drones, with export to third armies built into the president's sentence, tilts the ledger.

What "assembly" means

An assembly plant is not a full design house. Kits, sensors and software can still come from Israel while airframes or final fit-out happen in Serbia. Krušik's role on warheads is the part that makes the line a weapons factory rather than a hobby shop. Vučić told a worker the machine looked more complicated than he expected. That is the level of technical detail he offered.

The export clause matters more than the headcount. One hundred jobs is small. A licensed line that can sell to other governments is a foreign-policy tool. Vučić did not name customer countries. He said the public would be impressed by what is being made. Without a site tour, that claim cannot be checked against the airframes on the floor.

The next facts to watch are a location, a company name on a plaque, and whether the three extra factories appear as dirt works or stay as a sentence on Instagram. Until then the story is a president, an ambassador, a closed shop floor and a warhead plant with a long memory in the Serbian arms industry.