The Guardian: Sending Patriot systems to Kiev will create long-term problems for NATO

MOSCOW, December 21 – RIA Novosti. He wrote that the US should think well before handing over the Patriot air defense systems to Ukraine. Guard Senior Army Warfare Fellow at the Royal United Services Institute (RUSI) Jack Watling.

According to him, sending such complexes to Kiev will create long-term problems for NATO. The West, in particular, risks weakening its position ahead of China, as the stocks of these systems are very limited.

“The United States has far less than it needs to maintain its forces in the Indo-Pacific region,” the publication says.

At the same time, Watling notes that the consumption of ammunition in Ukraine significantly exceeds current stocks, and artillery wears out the barrels faster than they can be replaced.

“The depletion of NATO’s defense industry arsenals makes it impossible for the alliance to support long-term, high-intensity operations. In the case of systems like the Patriot, the task becomes more difficult because precision weapons, for example air defense missiles, take much longer to manufacture than unguided artillery shells. ” he writes.

He urged the United States and its partners to carefully balance aid to Ukraine, taking into account the needs of their own security.

“It is important for the Ukrainians to understand that they cannot use these supplies of ammunition indefinitely and therefore can only hit priority targets.”

Russia has been conducting a special military operation in Ukraine since February 24. Against this background, the United States and its NATO allies continue to pump weapons into the Kyiv regime, allocating tens of billions of dollars for this. However, some Western politicians have repeatedly stated that military support to Ukraine jeopardizes the security of NATO countries: many countries are already faced with a shortage of artillery munitions.

Moscow has repeatedly said that the supply of Western weapons only prolongs the conflict and that arms shipments have become a legitimate target for the Russian military.