Ukraine has some of the world’s best expertise on intercepting Iranian drones — and now wants to capitalize on it.
Donald Trump’s attack on Iran reveals that Ukraine does have some cards to play, after all.
The U.S. president lambasted Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy last year in the White House, telling him: “You don’t have the cards right now.” One year on, Ukraine is holding talks with polite American officials in Kyiv keen to get a look-in on Ukraine’s world-leading anti-drone technology.
“Partners are turning to us, to Ukraine, for help,” Zelenskyy said on Wednesday night. “Requests on this matter have also come from the American side.”
Zelenskyy said he was also talking to Arab nations seeking to upgrade defenses against Iran, such as the United Arab Emirates, Qatar, Jordan and Bahrain. He was clear that Kyiv was seeking to gain strategic leverage from the talks. ___
Ukraine is forced to capitalize on it.
Around Iran, during 3 days, the US, Israel and Arab countries have shot off the same amount of Patriot missiles as Ukraine has consumed in 4 years. There will be a severe shortage.
The balance of ballistic attack and defense is tilted heavily in favour of attack. For example, an Iranian “Zolfaghar” ballistic missile costs around 150 000 euros, while a Patriot PAC-3 interceptor might cost 4 000 000 euros, and typical defensive tactics involve shooting 2 per target. This means the shortage will not be improving for a long time.
Ukraine has a dependency they cannot alleviate. About 75% of Ukraininan antiballistic defense relies on Patriot imports from the US. European production of Aster and South Korean production of KM-SAM is unlikely to have enough volume, and buying from South Korea is doubtful if the US is pulling out Patriot and THAAD deployments for sending to the Middle East. South Korea has North Korea to worry about.
If Ukraine does not apply every lever to ensure continued supply of Patriot missiles, a time will come when Putin will be given a menu every morning - to decide which Ukrainian power plants must stop working next night.
This is not something that Ukraine can afford. They cannot harden all power plants. They cannot rely on purchasging energy. They cannot catch all Russian launch vehicles. They have made a good attempt at attacking a factory producing Russian “Iskander” missiles. Results are not conclusive, only 1 building was hit.
So, they will smile and offer an exchange. Then they will go back home and curse - properly. Foremost they will be cursing the utter stupidity of the orange toddler who picked an avoidable battle at the wrong time, or allowed the other war criminal to drag him into it.