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Ukraine urges more air‑defense systems as Russia increases missile and drone strikes, panelists say
Summary
At a U.S. Helsinki Commission briefing, Ukraine’s defense attache and security experts said Russian forces have dramatically expanded missile and one‑way drone strikes, and urged faster, larger transfers of layered air‑defense systems, expanded munitions, and stepped‑up sanctions enforcement to disrupt Russian production and supply chains.
Major General Boris Kremenitsky, defense attache at Ukraine’s embassy in Washington, told a public briefing hosted by the U.S. Helsinki Commission that Ukraine needs substantially more air‑defense capability to protect cities and critical infrastructure as Russia steps up long‑range strikes and one‑way attack drones.
"Since this war started 3 and a half years ago, we were saying that priority for Ukraine is air defense, and we were asking our partners to support us in closing Ukrainian sky," Major General Boris Kremenitsky said during the panel. He described rising nightly salvos of missiles and waves of strike drones and warned that Russia has increased warhead sizes and refined drone designs to evade defenses.
The concern is not limited to quantities. Dara Masako, a senior fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, described qualitative changes in Russian strikes that make interception more difficult. "They are structured to arrive on target within minutes of one another in an attempt to saturate the defenders," Masako said, citing new flight paths, penetration aids and combinations of cruise, ballistic and loitering munitions.
Why this matters
Panelists documented a sharp increase in the scale and variety of attacks that threaten Ukrainian civilians, emergency responders and energy and health…
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