In a strange case of crowdfunding meets national defense, a group of Ukrainians have launched a website to help fund the construction of a fleet of drones to patrol the country’s border with Russia. The People’s Project has successfully raised approximately $36,000 to build an initial squadron of 10 “People’s UAVs”—autonomous octocopter drones equipped with cameras.

The project is a response to the Ukrainian Defense Ministry’s pleas for assistance. The cash-strapped Ukrainian military, which has an annual budget of $1.9 billion, began making public appeals for donations to help equip and train troops to counter pressure from the Russian military and pro-Russian separatists in eastern Ukraine. Led in part by Dmitry Tymchuk, the director of “Information Resistance” at the Center of Military and Political Research in Kiev, the People’s Project has so far furnished the Defense Ministry with communication gear and has raised money to equip a paratrooper battalion.

When officials expressed a desire for unmanned surveillance and reconnaissance aircraft earlier this year, the group turned to local engineers to come up with a design that could quickly be fielded. The drone doesn’t measure up to the specifications of military-grade fixed-wing unmanned aircraft—it has a top speed of 120 kilometers per hour and can stay aloft for just an hour at a time. But it’s seen as a stopgap measure by the People’s Project—“this craft will be fighting right away,” the organizers said in their fundraising pitch on the website.

While the first round of fundraising has pulled together enough cash to build an initial 10 drones, the organizers believe that hundreds may be needed.