NATO Allies Commit to Sending Dozens of Air Defense Systems to Ukraine, Including Four Patriots

 President Joe Biden speaks during an event commemorating the 75th Anniversary of NATO at the Andrew W. Mellon Auditorium on the sidelines of the NATO summit in Washington on Tuesday, July 9, 2024. (AP)
President Joe Biden speaks during an event commemorating the 75th Anniversary of NATO at the Andrew W. Mellon Auditorium on the sidelines of the NATO summit in Washington on Tuesday, July 9, 2024. (AP)
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NATO Allies Commit to Sending Dozens of Air Defense Systems to Ukraine, Including Four Patriots

 President Joe Biden speaks during an event commemorating the 75th Anniversary of NATO at the Andrew W. Mellon Auditorium on the sidelines of the NATO summit in Washington on Tuesday, July 9, 2024. (AP)
President Joe Biden speaks during an event commemorating the 75th Anniversary of NATO at the Andrew W. Mellon Auditorium on the sidelines of the NATO summit in Washington on Tuesday, July 9, 2024. (AP)

The US and an array of other NATO allies will send Ukraine dozens of air defense systems in the coming months, including at least four of the powerful Patriot systems that Kyiv has been desperately seeking to help fight off Russian advances in the war, according to a new joint agreement.

“Today I’m announcing a historic donation of air defense equipment for Ukraine,” President Joe Biden said Tuesday at the opening of the NATO summit in Washington. “The United States, Germany, the Netherlands, Romania and Italy will provide Ukraine with the equipment for five additional strategic air defense systems.”

In addition, he said that in the coming months the United States and others will provide dozens of other tactical air defense systems and hundreds of munitions for them.

The announcement was made with much fanfare as the summit opened at the Mellon Auditorium, where the North Atlantic Treaty was first signed in 1949, establishing NATO. There both Biden and NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg spoke urgently about the importance of the alliance and the need to stand together in support of Ukraine.

Russian President Vladimir Putin wants nothing less than to “wipe Ukraine off the map,” Biden said. “And we know Putin won’t stop in Ukraine. But make no mistake, Ukraine can and will stop Putin.”

According to the joint statement released Tuesday, the US, Germany and Romania will send Ukraine additional Patriot batteries, while the Netherlands and others will provide Patriot components to make up one more battery. Italy will provide a SAMP-T air defense system.

Other allies, including Canada, Norway, Spain and the United Kingdom, will provide a number of other systems that will help Ukraine expand its coverage. Those systems include NASAMS, HAWKs, IRIS T-SLM, IRIS T-SLS and Gepards. And other nations have agreed to provide munitions for those systems.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, in a social media post on Tuesday, made it clear that air defense is still his country's key request, and he has repeatedly asked for more Patriot systems.

“We are fighting for more air defense systems for Ukraine, and I’m confident we will succeed,” he said. “We are also striving to secure more aircraft, including F-16s. Additionally, we are pushing for enhanced security guarantees for Ukraine, including weapons, financial aid, and political support.”

Earlier this year, he said Ukraine urgently needs seven more Patriot batteries to fend off Russian strikes against the power grid, the military and civilian areas using destructive glide bombs.

The Patriot systems, he said, would help prevent Russian aircraft from flying close enough to drop the glide bombs on civilians and critical infrastructure. He said Russia had been firing 3,000 bombs into his country each month.

The commitment for new air defense systems comes as Russia continues its relentless bombardment of Ukraine, including a massive barrage that struck a children’s hospital in Kyiv on Monday and killed at least 42 people.

On Tuesday, Zelenskyy urged “decisive actions” from the US and Europe to strengthen his troops and vowed to do everything possible to defeat Russia.

The United States has already sent Ukraine two Patriot missile systems — one late last year and, according to US officials, another last month. And Romania’s top defense body said late last month that the country would donate a Patriot missile system to neighboring Ukraine.

A number of European allies have been reluctant to part with their air defense systems, as they worry about possible threats from Russia as well.

US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin two years ago set up a coalition of more than 50 countries to help gather and coordinate contributions of weapons and training to Ukraine.



At Least 28 are Hurt as Driver Plows into Demonstration in Germany

German police conduct random checks at border with Austria, soon to be introduced at all land frontiers in Kiefersfelden, Germany, September 10, 2024. REUTERS/Ayhan Uyanik
German police conduct random checks at border with Austria, soon to be introduced at all land frontiers in Kiefersfelden, Germany, September 10, 2024. REUTERS/Ayhan Uyanik
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At Least 28 are Hurt as Driver Plows into Demonstration in Germany

German police conduct random checks at border with Austria, soon to be introduced at all land frontiers in Kiefersfelden, Germany, September 10, 2024. REUTERS/Ayhan Uyanik
German police conduct random checks at border with Austria, soon to be introduced at all land frontiers in Kiefersfelden, Germany, September 10, 2024. REUTERS/Ayhan Uyanik

A driver drove a car into a union demonstration in central Munich on Thursday, injuring at least 28 people including children, authorities said. Officials said it was believed to be an attack.

The suspect, an Afghan asylum-seeker, was arrested. The incident follows a series of attacks involving immigrants in recent months that have pushed migration to the forefront of the campaign for Germany’s Feb. 23 election.

Participants in a demonstration by the service workers’ union ver.di were walking along a street at about 10:30 a.m. when the car overtook a police vehicle following the gathering, accelerated and plowed into the back of the group, police said, The AP reported.

Officers arrested the suspect after firing a shot at the car, deputy police chief Christian Huber said. He added that at least 28 people were believed to be injured, some of them seriously. A damaged Mini was seen at the scene, along with debris including shoes.

The suspect was a 24-year-old Afghan asylum-seeker, Huber said. Bavaria’s state interior minister, Joachim Herrmann, said he was known to authorities in connection with theft and drug offenses, but didn't give further details. The state’s justice minister, Georg Eisenreich, said a prosecutors’ department that investigates extremism and terror was looking into the case.

“It is simply terrible,” Bavarian governor Markus Söder told reporters at the scene. “We feel with the victims, we are praying for the victims — we hope very much that they all make it.”

“It is suspected to be an attack — a lot points to that," Söder added.

Mayor Dieter Reiter said he was “deeply shocked” by the incident. He said that children were among those injured.

The Munich incident comes three weeks after a two-year-old boy and a man were killed in a knife attack in Aschaffenburg, also in Bavaria. An Afghan whose asylum application was rejected was the suspect in that attack, which propelled migration to the center of the German election campaign.

The Aschaffenburg attack followed knife attacks in Mannheim and in Solingen last year in which the suspects were immigrants from Afghanistan and Syria, respectively — in the latter case, also a rejected asylum-seeker who was supposed to have left the country.

In the December Christmas market car ramming in Magdeburg, the suspect was a Saudi doctor who previously had come to various regional authorities’ attention.

Germany's main opposition conservative bloc, in which Söder is a prominent figure, has demanded a tougher approach to irregular migration, calling for many more people to be turned back at the country's borders and for an increase in deportations. Curbing migration is also a core issue for the far-right Alternative for Germany, which polls put in second place behind the conservatives.

“This is more evidence that we can't go from attack to attack and show dismay, thank police for their deployment," Söder said. “We actually have to change something. This is not the first such act; so, we feel with the people today, but at the same time we are determined that something must change in Germany, and quickly.”

Center-left Chancellor Olaf Scholz's government said it already has done a lot to reduce irregular migration, and that the opposition's plans are incompatible with German and European Union law.

Scholz described the latest incident as “really terrible.”

“Anyone who commits crimes in Germany will not just be punished severely and have to go to prison, but must expect that he cannot continue his stay in Germany — and that also goes for countries that it is very difficult to send people back to,” he said.

The chancellor noted that his government deported convicted criminals to Afghanistan on a flight in August and is working to do so again — “and not just once, but continually.”

The Bavarian capital will see heavy security in the coming days because the three-day Munich Security Conference, an annual gathering of international foreign and security policy officials, opens on Friday.

Herrmann said authorities do not believe the car ramming was connected to the conference, but they still need to determine the motive.