OddsFrontGermany says it cannot give Ukraine more Patriot systems for now, urges allies to step up
Defense Minister Boris Pistorius says Berlin has reached its limit on Patriot deliveries to Ukraine without leaving gaps at home, and wants other countries to do more as Russian strikes on energy sites continue.
Germany has reached the limit of what it can offer Ukraine in Patriot air defense systems for the time being, Defense Minister Boris Pistorius has said, calling on other countries to carry more of the load.
Pistorius made the comments in an interview with Berliner Morgenpost, which were relayed by the magazine Focus on Nov. 7, according to The Kyiv Independent and Ukrainska Pravda. He said Berlin had already supplied several Patriot systems to Ukraine, together with a large quantity of missiles.
Gaps Berlin will not accept
According to The Kyiv Independent, the minister argued that anything handed over now could not be replaced in the near term. That would leave holes in Germany’s own defenses, which he described as unacceptable to take on responsibly. “We cannot do more right now,” he was quoted as saying.
Pistorius urged other countries to raise their contributions to Ukraine’s air defenses. He added that the matter would be on the agenda when the Ukraine Defense Contact Group, also known as the Ramstein format, meets in mid-November, the outlets reported.
Pressure before winter
The statement comes while Russia keeps attacking Ukrainian energy infrastructure and Kyiv is short of interceptors as winter approaches, The Kyiv Independent noted. On Nov. 4, President Volodymyr Zelensky met Pistorius in Berlin to discuss speeding up deliveries of German-made PAC-2 missiles for Patriot batteries. Zelensky said Ukraine holds a substantial contract to buy the missiles over the next two years, but needs them sooner to protect the country.
Ukrainska Pravda recalled that Ukrainian Defense Minister Yevhenii Khmara had separately appealed to the so-called E5 group, made up of Germany, the United Kingdom, France, Poland and Italy. He asked them to consider sending 10% of their interceptor stockpiles for Patriot and IRIS-T systems to Ukraine, in return for deliveries Kyiv expects later. The outlet also cited Zelensky as saying that Ukraine is receiving, on average, only 12 Patriot missiles per month this year.
Assessment of Russian losses
In the same interview, Pistorius said Russia was taking heavy losses at the front. He put them at 30,000 to 40,000 troops per month, while Moscow was making little territorial progress, according to The Kyiv Independent.
What to watch
Neither outlet reported that any other country had yet offered additional systems. The mid-November Ramstein-format session is the next scheduled occasion where Pistorius’s appeal to allies, and Khmara’s stockpile proposal, could be taken up. How quickly any new commitments or faster PAC-2 deliveries could reach Ukraine before winter was not specified in the reports.