The US will “rush” Patriot air defense missiles to Ukraine as part of a military aid package, Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin has said.
Speaking on Friday, Austin said that the US would send “critical interceptors” to Ukraine for its Patriot systems as part of a $6 billion deal.
Austin’s comments come as Russia hit parts of Ukraine with a large missile strike on Friday, targeting energy facilities and power plants in several regions.
Russia launched a total of 34 missiles at Ukraine by air, ground, and sea, Mykola Oleshchuk, the head of Ukraine’s air force, wrote on Telegram.
The barrage included Iskander ballistic missiles, Kh-59 cruise missiles, and ship-launched Kalibr missiles, among others, he added.
Ukrainian Energy Minister German Galushchenko wrote on Facebook that Russia had targeted facilities in the regions of Dnipropetrovsk, Ivano-Frankivsk, and Lviv, adding that there had been “damage to equipment.”
DTEK, a power operator, said equipment at four of its thermal power plants was “severely damaged” in the attacks.
Austin warned against thinking of Patriot missiles as a “silver bullet” against such strikes, however.
“It’s not just Patriots that they [the Ukrainians] need, they need other types of systems and interceptors as well,” Austin said. “I would caution us all in terms of making Patriot the silver bullet.”
The think tank the Institute for the Study of War said in an update on the conflict that while no single weapon could be thought of as a “silver bullet,” the Patriot was “one of the very few air defense systems able to engage Russian ballistic missiles and also to hit Russian fighter-bombers outside the range of Russian glide bombs.”
It comes after the Spanish newspaper El Pais reported that Spain would also send Patriot missiles to Ukraine amid increasing pressure from its EU and NATO allies.
The report said Spain would deliver “a very limited number” of the missiles due to their high cost and because the country’s war reserve was about only around 50 units.
Both the US and Spain decided not to send launchers for the Patriot system, however.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has repeatedly called for allies to send more Patriot systems to Ukraine.
He said earlier this month that Ukraine needed “seven more Patriots or similar air defense systems” to defend its cities from Russian strikes.
“‘Patriots’ can only be called air defense systems if they work and save lives rather than standing immobile somewhere in storage bases,” Zelenskyy added on X.
