BELFAST — Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskyy is keen on ordering more than two dozen Raytheon-produced Patriot air defense systems, amid Kyiv’s attempts to fend off Russia’s aerial bombardment.
“Today, we want to order 25 Patriot systems from the United States,” Zelenskyy wrote on X today, sayin there is a “clear budget” for the acquisition and imploring European “colleagues” to loan “their systems now and then take back ours once they arrive from the manufacturers.”
“These systems are produced over several years, and we would not want to wait,” he said.
Zelenskyy previously said Ukraine sought 25 Patriots, and at the time noted that the “difficulty lies in the production queue.”
“The White House can change their queue if there is political will,” he said in October.
According to Politico, Ukraine hopes to finance the Patriot acquisition through a €140 billion ($162 billion) reparations loan, funded by frozen Russian assets. European leaders are still to approve such a deal however.
Figures from the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) thinktank claim that a Patriot battery costs $1.1 billion — split between $690 million for the weapon systems’ missiles and $400 million for the system itself.
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Zelenskyy’s latest push also comes amid the US decision to reshuffle Patriot deliveries to support Kyiv.
In July, the DoD told Switzerland that it “will reprioritize” the European country’s Patriot deliveries, based on a 2022 order of five systems initially scheduled for handover between 2026 and 2028.
“Switzerland will receive its systems later than planned,” said Switzerland’s Federal Department of Defence, Civil Protection and Sport in a statement at the time. “It is currently unclear how many systems will be affected and whether the delivery of guided missiles will also be affected.”
Other European Patriot customers include Germany, Greece, the Netherlands, Poland, Romania, Spain and Sweden.
In Ukraine, the weapon system has been credited with successfully intercepting Russian ballistic missiles, including the Kh-47M2 Kinzhal weapon, but a reported downturn in intercept rates and Moscow rolling out flight trajectory changes to its ballistic missile arsenal, appear to indicate its frontline effectiveness is waning.