Increasing Ukraine's anti-aircraft batteries seems easier said than achieved

US President Joe Biden promised to help Ukraine obtain air defense systems with a longer range than the shoulder-loaded Stinger missile launchers already on the ground. However, getting the powerful anti-missile batteries urgently needed by the Ukrainian army seems easier said than achieved.

The US president, who wants to support the Ukrainian army without directly entering into conflict with Russia, seeks to provide Ukraine with a better defense against the Russian artillery that is plaguing its cities.

The ideal armament to achieve this would be a Patriot type anti-aircraft battery system, whose effectiveness has been amply demonstrated in recent years in Iraq and the Persian Gulf.

Installed on trucks, Patriot has a radar capable of automatically detecting and intercepting an aircraft, drone or missile within a radius of more than 100 kilometers, as well as a surveillance post for three soldiers and a battery of intercepting missiles.

However, the Ukrainian army is not trained to operate sophisticated US weaponry. Instead, they know how to maneuver the Russian S-300 first-generation anti-aircraft system, competitor to the Patriot, whose range is more limited but sufficient to protect Kharkiv or Kiev, two cities close to the Russian border, from which most missiles are fired.

Those S-300s could arrive from countries of the former Soviet bloc that still deploy them, particularly Slovakia and Bulgaria, where US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin visited in recent days.

The obstacle is that these countries are still dependent on the S-300 for their own safety and are demanding to replenish them — in other words, with Patriots — before giving them to Ukraine.

“We are willing to do this immediately when we have the appropriate replacement,” Slovak Defense Minister Jaroslav Nad told reporters Thursday during a meeting with Austin in Bratislava.

- 'Insufficient' -

On Friday, the Netherlands said it would deploy a Patriot battery to the Sliac military base in central Slovakia, and Germany confirmed that it would send two more batteries to the country, which could facilitate the transfer of Slovakia's only S-300 batteries to Ukraine.

However, German and Dutch Patriot batteries would not arrive in Slovakia immediately - the Netherlands estimates that the shipment would be on April 15 at the earliest - and time is ticking for the Ukrainian army.

While several countries may be ready to supply Kiev with spare S-300 missiles, Ukraine needs many complete systems, including radars and monitoring stations.

“An S-300 is better than none,” says Brent Eastwood, defense editor in '1945', an online foreign policy magazine. But “it is still insufficient”.

Ukraine had about 100 S-300 batteries before President Vladimir Putin launched the invasion last month, and the Russian army claims to have destroyed some 40 at the beginning of the war on February 24, Eastwood, a former US soldier, recently wrote.

The country is huge and just protecting one city is enough, he told AFP.

“If I were a war strategist for Ukraine, I would want four S-300 batteries for each quadrant of Kiev. That deployment would help me sleep more peacefully at night,” he said.

Another NATO country, Greece, has S-300 but would also need to be offered to replace them. In any case, even if the Pentagon, whose inventory of Patriots is limited, decided to lend its Patriots to these countries, it would take weeks for them to reach their destination.

Washington is trying to convince allies in other regions to lend their Patriots, but again it will not be an easy task.

Mark Milley, Chief of the United States Joint Chiefs of Staff, reportedly asked Japan for help on Thursday.

He telephoned his counterpart to discuss the “current security environment in the Pacific and about Russia's ongoing invasion of Ukraine,” according to a recount of their conversation published Friday by the Pentagon.

The Gulf countries have numerous anti-aircraft batteries to protect themselves from Iranian missiles, but they do not seem to be keen to seek aid from Ukraine.

Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, which are among the largest exporters of crude oil in the world and whose ties are strong with both the West and Moscow, have so far avoided taking any stance against Russia.

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