The Ukrainian soldiers tasked with operating American-built Patriot surface-to-air missile batteries to defend their country’s skies against Russian missiles and other aircraft will be trained on the system at Fort Sill in Oklahoma, according to a report in The Washington Post.
Citing a US official, the Post said the training sessions could begin as soon as this month at the Oklahoma installation, which is where US troops specialising in field artillery and missile defence receive their own basic training courses in those specialties.
The provision of the Patriot system to Ukraine was first announced last month by President Joe Biden when he hosted Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky at the White House. Both the US and Germany are each providing Kyiv with a single Patriot battery, with the American contribution coming as part of a $2bn defence assistance package approved by Mr Biden and made public during Mr Zelensky’s brief trip to the American capital.
A White House official said the missile batteries will serve as a “critical asset to defend the Ukrainian people against Russia's barbaric attacks on Ukraine's critical infrastructure”.
Last week, a senior Pentagon official, Laura Cooper, said at a briefing last week that the process of training Ukrainian forces to operate the complex US-made missile system could take several months.
“Patriot is not an immediate-term capability,” said Cooper, a deputy assistant secretary of defense. “But we will start that training very soon.”
Pentagon spokesperson Brigadier General Patrick Ryder also told reporters the US was “exploring a variety of options” for training the Ukrainians, including sites in the US, sites abroad, or “a combination of both”.
The delivery of Patriot missiles to Ukraine’s defence forces will come just before the one-year anniversary of the most recent phase of Russia’s invasion of Ukrainian territory, which first began when unmarked Russian troops and vehicles seized the Crimea peninsula.
Since Russia invaded with the intent of toppling the Ukrainian government last February, Ukraine’s forces have managed to deny Moscow nearly all the objectives Russian President Vladimir Putin set out for the offensive. Mr Zelensky’s government still stands, and the West, led by Mr Biden, has united behind Ukraine by sending billions of dollars in defence and humanitarian assistance.
The Russian invasion has also upended the security postures of several major European powers. In the weeks following Moscow’s first offensive actions, Germany’s government pledged to double its’ defence budget, ending decades of post-Cold War drawdowns in military spending, with leaders calling for a rethinking of the pacifistic mindset that has dominated German politics since reunification.
The war has also prompted two major neutral nations, Sweden and Finland, to give up their long-held neutrality and commit to joining the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation.
When Mr Zelensky addressed the US Congress during his visit last month, he thanked the US for its’ leadership and predicted that 2023 would mark “a turning point” in the war, “the point when Ukrainian courage and American resolve must guarantee the future of our common freedom”.
“If your Patriots stop the Russian terror against our cities, it will let Ukrainian patriots work to the full to defend our freedom,” he said.
