Ukrainian drones crashing in Latvia trigger a government crisis as the nation’s defense minister resigns

On Sunday, May 10, Latvia’s Defense Minister Andris Spruds announced his resignation — three days after Ukrainian drones that had crossed into Latvian airspace from Russia crashed near the Latvian city of Rezekne. The drones damaged empty fuel storage tanks at an oil depot. No one was injured, but the political damage has proved more serious. The incident occurred five months before scheduled parliamentary elections and almost immediately shifted from a military security question to a question of public trust in the government. Why did this drone incident lead to a minister’s resignation? And what other consequences could follow? Sergey Potapkin, a political scientist and researcher at the Latvian Institute of International Affairs, analyzes the situation.

This is more than a local story about off-course drones. The incident is a test for a state that has been telling its citizens since 2022 that Latvia sits on NATO’s eastern flank, close to a persistent Russian threat, and must therefore be prepared for any eventuality. Latvia is not a party to the war, but the war’s reach extends to its territory: from hybrid threats to the risk that drones and missiles may fall on the wrong side of the border.

In the early hours of May 7, according to Latvia’s Defense Ministry, three drones crossed into Latvian airspace from Russia: two came down on Latvian territory, while a third later exited. One struck the (fortunately empty) tanks at a fuel depot in Rezekne, a city near the Russian border. Residents of some border areas received drone attack warnings in the early morning, but in Rezekne itself, according to local media reports, the alert came only as people could already see and hear the drones overhead.

The incident exposed a defense system far from ready. Beyond the basic fact that the drones were not intercepted at the border and that public warnings came too late, the government’s response was delayed by five hours. There was no timely information on the aircraft’s number, origin, or landing sites.

Initially, officials explained that the drones had not been shot down for safety reasons: the military could not rule out that falling debris or fire would endanger civilians and infrastructure on the ground. But the commander of Latvia’s National Armed Forces, Kaspars Pudans, later acknowledged that the situation was worse: the drones had not entered Latvian airspace simultaneously, and the National Armed Forces’ sensors had failed to detect the first one.

What the public saw instead of a functioning response system was delayed communication, mutual recriminations, and an after-the-fact effort to explain what had happened.

Prime Minister Evika Silina acknowledged that something had gone wrong in the state’s response — in detection, in public warnings, and in its communication afterward.

Why did the drone strikes lead to a minister’s resignation?

This is not the first time drones have crashed in Latvia. In September 2024, a Russian Shahed drone carrying a warhead fell in the Rezekne District. In March 2026, a Ukrainian drone flying in from Russia came down in the Kraslava District. And in early May, there were air-threat warnings in the country’s eastern regions, though no aircraft crossed the border.

The May 7 drone incident was foreseeable. The government had had time to establish protocols for detection, trajectory assessment, interception, public warnings, coordination with local governments, debris search, and public messaging.

In this context, Spruds’s resignation is not surprising. He had already faced criticism after previous drone incidents on Latvian territory, and in early April, the Saeima had even voted on removing him (43 deputies supported his dismissal, 50 voted against). The speed with which the prime minister named a new candidate creates the impression that replacing Spruds had at least been discussed in advance, even if the decision was formally announced on May 10.

Latvia’s coalition structure shapes much of the political fallout here. Silina’s cabinet rests on three parties: New Unity, the prime minister’s own party; the Progressives, a left-liberal force to which former Defense Minister Andris Spruds belongs; and the Union of Greens and Farmers, a conservative-regionalist party. It is an ideologically mixed coalition governing a country that faces a war on its borders, economic stagnation, an acute demographic crisis, and a public exhausted by years of upheaval.

Andris Spruds said his departure was an attempt to protect the Latvian military from being drawn into a political campaign. He also said his party, the Progressives, would soon consider whether to leave the ruling coalition — all because of Prime Minister Evika Silina’s claim that Spruds had not resigned on his own initiative but had been asked to do so by her.

In effect, the drones have triggered a government crisis and could now bring down Latvia’s ruling coalition just six months before elections. They landed in existing fractures between coalition partners and exposed a gap between the government’s war-readiness rhetoric and what it can deliver in a crisis.

For New Unity, meanwhile, the minister’s resignation proved politically convenient. Silina’s party takes responsibility for the government as a whole and sheds a minister who had come under fire. At the same time, the defense minister represented the Progressives, and his departure gives New Unity an opportunity to distance itself from a coalition partner that had grown increasingly problematic in recent months.

The Progressives face other reputational problems as well. One is the controversy over extending a loan to the national carrier airBaltic. Another is the failure to advance the Rail Baltica railway project, which is set to connect Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania. That spring, the dispute over support for airBaltic had itself threatened the coalition’s stability; the prime minister publicly said she was prepared to risk the coalition over the airline decision.

How the drone strikes could lead to positive changes in Latvia’s defense capabilities

Latvia’s Foreign Ministry delivered a formal protest note to Russia over the drone incident, saying that Russia, by waging an aggressive war against Ukraine, was creating security risks across the wider region, and that the drones had entered Latvian airspace from Russia.

Three days later, Kyiv acknowledged that the drones were Ukrainian, and Ukraine’s foreign minister, Andrii Sybiha, linked the incident to Russian electronic warfare systems that may have diverted the Ukrainian drones from their targets inside Russia.

Since the start of the full-scale war, Latvia has given Ukraine unconditional support and maintained that Russia must be defeated on the battlefield. Even as the war dragged on and problems at the front became apparent, Riga’s official rhetoric remained almost unchanged. So when Ukrainian aircraft create a risk for Latvians, the authorities choose their words carefully: they emphasize Russia’s responsibility as the aggressor, speak of the need for an investigation, and avoid making the Ukrainian origin of the drones the central point of their statements.

In Rezekne, that caution worked against the government: the nearly three-day pause before a clear acknowledgment of the drones’ origin looked to many Latvians not like a fact-checking exercise but like an unwillingness to state a politically inconvenient truth — namely, that even if the ultimate political and military responsibility lies with Moscow, the physical risk to Latvian civilians can also come from “friendly fire.”

After the incident, Sybiha said Ukraine would be willing to send experts to help protect the airspace of the Baltic states. The situation may strike some as absurd: Ukrainian drones fly into Latvia, and Ukraine offers to help deal with them. But when it comes to actually solving the problem, the political awkwardness may be a price worth paying.

As long as Russia’s war against Ukraine continues, such incidents may happen again. Ukraine faces drone attacks daily and has air-defense experience no other European country can match. If Ukrainian specialists help Latvian services detect threats more effectively, make decisions faster, and build a practical response system, the question of where a specific drone originates becomes secondary. Any drone will have to be intercepted, whether Ukrainian or Russian. Ukraine, moreover, already has experience training air-defense units abroad.

After Andris Spruds’s resignation, Latvian President Edgars Rinkevics said the current moment calls for a professional military officer at the helm of the Defense Ministry. Prime Minister Silina offered the post to Colonel Raivis Melnis, who had served as Latvia’s Defense Ministry representative in Ukraine and as the prime minister’s adviser on military cooperation.

The appointment could go either way: a symbolic concession after a scandal, or the start of a genuine defense overhaul. Latvia’s defense spending is rising rapidly, but the pace has outrun the country’s capacity. The result is a shortage of experience and expertise: military procurement has been plagued by scandal, and coordination with neighboring countries has faltered. Meanwhile, drones keep falling.

Latvia does not have to choose between political accountability and technical solutions. It needs both. A minister may go, but in wartime, the question is not whether drones will fall on Latvian territory again. The question is where and when.