US President Donald Trump's surprise announcement on July 9 that he will approve a license for Ukraine to manufacture its own Patriot missile interceptors has been hailed as a potential breakthrough for Kyiv. However, defense experts caution that the agreement could take years to yield tangible results, leaving Ukraine vulnerable in the interim.
Trump delivered the news during a conversation with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky on the sidelines of the NATO summit in Ankara, Turkey. "We're going to give a license to you to make Patriots [. . .] This way, you can't complain that we're not giving them enough," Trump told Zelensky.
Ukraine's Desperate Need for Interceptors
For weeks, Zelensky has warned that Ukraine is running critically low on Patriot interceptors, severely limiting its ability to shield cities from near-constant Russian ballistic missile attacks. While Ukrainian forces can still intercept drones and cruise missiles without sophisticated interceptors, ballistic missiles present an entirely different challenge.
"Ukraine is completely out of Patriot missiles, so they desperately need them," said Huseyn Aliyev, an expert on the war in Ukraine at the University of Glasgow. He added that Russia has deliberately intensified its use of ballistic missiles, knowing full well that Ukraine lacks sufficient interceptors.
The devastating consequences of this shortage became grimly apparent on July 6, when Kyiv's defenses failed to intercept any of the 23 ballistic missiles Russia launched overnight. At least 22 people were killed in the ferocious strikes on the Ukrainian capital.
A Global Queue for Limited Supply
Ukraine's struggle to acquire new Patriot interceptors is compounded by surging global demand. European nations are urgently working to replenish their own stockpiles after transferring systems to Ukraine. Justin Bronk, an airpower specialist at the Royal United Services Institute in London, noted that European countries have purchased or placed orders for new Patriots to replace those they handed over to Ukraine.
Germany has invested several billion dollars to produce Patriots on its own territory. Meanwhile, South Korea and Japan face ballistic missile threats from China and are also seeking the coveted systems. Middle Eastern countries need to restock depleted inventories following the Iran war.
An Administrative Obstacle Course
Trump's announcement marks only the beginning of what could be a protracted process. Timur Kadyshev, senior researcher at the Institute for Peace Research and Security Policy at the University of Hamburg, stressed that the US president's declaration does not immediately grant Ukraine the license.
"It takes six months to a year just for the paperwork to go through because Patriot systems are under tight export controls," Kadyshev explained. Only after this administrative phase can Lockheed Martin, the primary manufacturer of Patriot defense systems, formally grant the license to Ukraine.
Another key question is whether the deal would cover the older PAC-2 interceptors or the newer PAC-3 models. Both have been used by Ukraine in the past, but they serve different purposes. The PAC-2 was designed primarily for air defense against helicopters, aircraft, and cruise missiles, while the PAC-3 is specifically engineered to intercept ballistic missiles.
The performance gap between the two models is significant. According to Kadyshev, a PAC-3 interceptor offers a 30 to 50 percent chance of stopping a Russian ballistic missile, with two typically fired to maximize effectiveness. In contrast, the PAC-2 GEMP-T model's interception probability drops below 10 percent.