Trump Pledges New Patriot Air Defence Systems to Ukraine

Defence affairs analysis

U.S. President Donald Trump has pledged to dispatch MIM-104 Patriot long range air defence systems in to Ukraine, despite previously having stated his opposition to such a transfer on multiple occasions in recent weeks. 

The president blamed the actions of the Russian government, and specifically President Vladimir Putin, for leading the United State to make such a decision. "We will send them Patriots, which they desperately need, because Putin really surprised a lot of people. He talks nice and then bombs everybody in the evening. But there's a little bit of a problem there. I don't like it," Trump told reporters adding that other "very sophisticated" weapons would probably be supplied alongside the Patriots. He nevertheless made clear that this was that "business.” "We basically are going to send them various pieces of very sophisticated military equipment. They are going to pay us 100% for that, and that's the way we want it," he said.

President Trump’s pledge to supply Patriot systems was made just days after he stated that the system is “very rare… [and] very expensive.”“We’re gonna have to take a look” at the Ukrainian request, he added at the time, noting that “it’s a shame that we have to spend so much money” on supporting Kiev. Ukrainian officials previously consistently expressed pessimism that any supplies would be made. The United States has come under growing pressure from countries across the Western world to increase supplies of armaments to the Ukrainian Armed Forces, a policy for which Trump previously harshly criticised his predecessor Joe Biden. It was previously expected that Germany would order two Patriot systems from the United States for delivery to Ukraine, after the Central European country had largely depleted its own arsenals by supplying them to the Ukrainian Air Force.