Kyiv: Ukraine's defence minister announced on Wednesday that his nation now has the Patriot surface-to-air guided missile systems from the United States that it has long yearned for and that Kiev is hoping will help defend it from Russian attacks during the conflict.
Defence Minister Oleksii Reznikov tweeted, "Today, our beautiful Ukrainian sky becomes more secure because Patriot air defence systems have arrived in Ukraine."
According to previous statements made by Ukrainian officials, the delivery of the Patriot systems, which Washington agreed to send in October, will be a significant development in the struggle against Moscow's full-scale invasion.
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Aircraft, cruise missiles, and shorter-range ballistic missiles are all targets for the Patriot. These weapons were used by Russia to bombard Ukraine, damaging civilian infrastructure, including homes and power plants during the winter.
The system's delivery would be a historic occasion, according to Yurii Ihnat, a spokesman for the Ukrainian air force, who said late on Tuesday that it would enable Ukrainians to hit Russian targets at a greater range.
Reznikov thanked the citizens of the US, Germany, and the Netherlands but omitted to mention the quantity or timing of the systems delivered. A Patriot system was listed as one of the military supplies delivered to Ukraine within the previous week on the federal government of Germany's website on Tuesday, and German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock confirmed that to lawmakers in Berlin on Wednesday.
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Reznikov claimed he first requested Patriot systems in August 2021, seven years after Russia's illegitimate annexation of the Crimean peninsula of Ukraine and five months before the Kremlin's forces launched their full-scale invasion. He called owning the system "a dream" but claimed that at the time, he had been told in the US that it was "impossible."
The Patriot battery, which can require up to 90 troops to operate and maintain it, has been taught to Ukrainian personnel. The Patriot systems have been fully mastered by our air defences. Moreover, our allies have honoured their commitments, Reznikov wrote.
Although it will strengthen Ukraine's arsenal against its more powerful adversary, experts have cautioned that the system's effectiveness is constrained and it may not be a game changer in the war.
In the 1980s, the US first used the Patriot. According to analysts, the launchers cost about $10 million each and the system costs about $4 million for each round. It is not cost-effective to use the Patriot to shoot down the Iranian drones that Russia has been purchasing and employing in Ukraine, which are much smaller and less expensive.
Daily civilian, but not military, casualties from Russian bombardment have been reported by Kyiv officials. The press office of the Ukrainian defence ministry reported that over the course of Tuesday and the previous night, at least four civilians were killed and 27 others were hurt in Ukraine.
According to the governor of the border town, a 50-year-old man and a 44-year-old woman were killed in a Russian airstrike on the area's northeastern Kharkiv region. Oleh Syniehubov stated in a broadcast
Oleksandr Prokudin, the governor of the Kherson region in southern Ukraine, reported that 12 rocket, artillery, mortar, tank, and drone attacks by Russian forces killed one civilian at a market in the heart of Kherson, the region's namesake capital, as well as a school close by.
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Russian forces shelled the border village of Richki in northern Ukraine, according to the local military administration, resulting in the death of one woman and the injury of another. Also at night, Russian forces launched drones that exploded at the southern Ukrainian region of Odesa.