Western nations rush defensive systems to Ukraine to counter Russian missiles.
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Version 0 of 1. KYIV, Ukraine — In just two days this week, Russian forces fired more than 100 cruise missiles and dozens of exploding drones at cities across Ukraine, far more than the nation’s aging air defenses were ever expected to encounter. And yet fewer than half made it to their targets, Ukrainian officials say. Ukraine’s success in knocking down those projectiles, and the death and destruction caused wherever missiles slipped through, has reinvigorated calls by officials in Kyiv for Western countries to provide more sophisticated defensive weapons systems. At a meeting at NATO headquarters in Brussels on Wednesday, the United States and other allies readily agreed, pledging to rapidly provide the weaponry. But for all the gaps made clear by the bombardment, which killed at least 19 people and scarred some two dozen Ukrainian cities, Ukrainian patchwork air defenses have proved to be one of the great successes of the war, and among the most unexpected. And Ukraine’s response to the attacks underscored how far the air defense units have come since President Vladimir V. Putin ordered his forces to invade on Feb. 24. On Monday, the first day of the bombardment, the country’s air defenses took out more than half of the roughly 80 cruise missiles fired, according to Ukraine’s military. And on Day 2 of the attack, only eight missiles were able to hit their targets out of a total of 28 fired, the military said. It said Ukrainian forces had also destroyed nearly 50 explosive drones this week. The figures could not be independently confirmed. Part of the success relates to better coordination between early warning systems, which detect rocket launches, and air defense units on the ground charged with shooting them down, said Justin Bronk, a senior research fellow at the Royal United Services Institute specializing in air power. The Caspian and Black Seas, from which many of Russia’s cruise missiles are launched, are closely monitored by both Ukrainian and Western militaries, giving air defense forces plenty of time to react. “Ukrainian air defenses have gotten significantly more capable, particularly better coordinated, since the early weeks of the war,” Dr. Bronk said. The 40 to 60 percent interception rates being reported by the Ukrainian military, he said, “are broadly in line with what we’d expect from a much more efficiently organized territorial air defense system.” |