Even Patriot missile production license would not solve Ukraine’s air defense shortage

Even if the United States were to grant Ukraine a license to produce Patriot interceptor missiles, according to a recent article in Foreign Policy, it would not resolve Ukraine’s critical air defense shortage. The article suggested that President Donald Trump may have abandoned earlier considerations of providing such a license and that Washington probably rejected Kyiv’s request for 300 Patriot interceptors.

The publication noted that constructing new production capacity would require years and that the Trump administration seems unwilling at present to share sensitive interceptor technologies with Ukraine. Experts quoted by the magazine stated that a licensing agreement would not address the immediate issue either. According to them, the problem is fundamentally mathematical: the United States currently manufactures around 600 PAC-3 interceptors annually and aims to triple this output in the coming years.

However, Ukraine requires between 150 and 180 missiles per month during periods of heavy Russian assaults. In the short term, Ukraine’s missile defense capabilities will still rely on dwindling allies’ reserves and temporary systems, along with ongoing Ukrainian and European initiatives to develop alternatives to Patriot missiles, as stated by Foreign Policy.

The outlet also argued that Ukraine’s air defense predicament should prompt the United States and its European allies to reconsider their strategies for countering mass ballistic missile attacks. This includes not only accelerating the expansion of interceptor production — a point the article highlighted as yet unmet despite Russia’s full-scale war against Ukraine entering its fifth year — but also considering whether Western leaders are ready to target an adversary’s ability to launch ballistic missiles in the first place.

This scenario was referred to as "shooting the archer," which involves targeting the launcher instead of merely intercepting the missiles after launch. On July 28, after a meeting with Trump, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy reportedly discussed the possibility of transferring to Ukraine a U.S. license to manufacture Patriot interceptor missiles.

On July 30, Trump reportedly told the Financial Times he was "not sure" about granting Ukraine such a license. On July 31, Trump reportedly stated that Washington had to be "very careful" about transferring technology for producing Patriot missiles. On August 5, citing its own sources, the Financial Times reported that during a meeting in the Oval Office with Zelenskyy, Trump rejected the Ukrainian president’s request for several hundred additional Patriot interceptor missiles, citing U.S. stockpile shortages and the need to protect American assets in the Middle East and Persian Gulf regions during the conflict with Iran.