The soaring demand for Patriot missiles, from the Middle East to Ukraine
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- Ukraine intercepted just one of 27 Russian ballistic missiles during a predawn Saturday assault on Kyiv that killed nine and wounded more than 30, with Zelenskyy blaming the failure on a lack of Patriot interceptors.
- CSIS reported in July that U.S. Patriot stockpiles fell from more than 2,300 before the Feb. 28 Iran war to roughly 800 today, while THAAD interceptors dropped from around 450 to about 250.
- Raytheon (RTX) and Lockheed Martin together produce fewer than 1,000 Patriot missiles per year, each costing around $4 million, a pace that has been outstripped by Russian and Iranian ballistic missile firing rates.
- Zelenskyy is publicly urging countries not to stockpile Patriots for "hypothetical scenarios" but to send them to Ukraine immediately, though no nation has publicly pledged additional missiles.
- Trump told Zelenskyy at last month's NATO summit he would grant Ukraine a license to build its own Patriots, then reversed course last Friday, citing the difficulty of "giving away that kind of technology."
- Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth called shortage reports a "manufactured story" in June, even though two months earlier he acknowledged that replenishing missile stockpiles could take "months and years," and Germany and Japan remain the only countries licensed to manufacture Patriots.
Why it matters: The Patriot is the sole reliable shield against ballistic missiles for roughly 20 U.S.-allied nations, and with fewer than 1,000 interceptors now being produced annually, the U.S. cannot simultaneously resupply Ukraine, restock its own depleted war reserve, and guarantee Gulf partners facing a potential renewed Iran fight — forcing allies to choose whose airspace gets protected.
