Russian ballistic missiles remain by far the primary threat in Russia’s deep-strike campaign against Ukraine, driven by shortfalls in Patriot interceptor stocks, according to a Western official.
Speaking on the war in Ukraine, the official said Russia’s deep-strike campaign was continuing, with “the Iskander, Kinzhal and Tsirkon ballistic missiles by far the primary threat due to Patriot stock shortcomings.” Of those, the official said, the Iskander was the one that mattered most.
Asked by the UK Defence Journal whether a trend could be identified in the frequency or type of munitions being used, the official said there were clear patterns, particularly in Russia’s use of long-range aviation. Because that was governed by a maintenance profile, the official said, there was “very broadly speaking a seven to ten day cadence in terms of the use of long-range aviation” and its air-launched cruise and ballistic missiles.
By volume, the threat was drones, and Ukraine was intercepting most of them. Ukraine’s interception rate was “around the 90% mark,” the official said, though jet-powered variants were proving harder. “The Geran-5s are causing Ukrainians increased problems, because it’s jet powered, and therefore some of the interception mechanisms Ukrainians were using are more challenged by that,” the official said.
The hardest problem, however, remained ballistic, “The key difficulty for the Ukrainians are the ballistic missiles,” the official said, naming the Iskander, Kinzhal and Tsirkon, and noting the Oreshnik had been used only sparingly. “Really, it’s the Iskanders when you boil down to it. That’s the munition that causes Ukrainians the greatest pain, because of their inability to intercept, and of course, Patriot stockpiles are low.”
July’s strike waves have borne the assessment out. In the overnight attack of 5 to 6 July, Russia fired 351 drones and 68 missiles at Ukraine, mainly at Kyiv, and Ukraine’s air force acknowledged that none of the 29 ballistic missiles used were intercepted. Air force spokesman Colonel Yurii Ihnat told Euronews the interception “success rate is low, to put it mildly,” and said Moscow was exploiting a serious shortage of PAC-2 and PAC-3 interceptors. On the night of 18 to 19 July, Russia launched 41 missiles and 125 drones in what Ukraine’s acting foreign minister described as the largest missile barrage against Kyiv since the war began, according to Al Jazeera, which reported that ballistic missiles had been used against the capital on at least seven occasions in July.
President Volodymyr Zelensky publicly appealed for more Patriot interceptors after the attack, and US President Donald Trump has said he is prepared to grant Ukraine licences to produce Patriot interceptors domestically, though details and timelines remain unclear.
The Iskander-M is a road-mobile short-range ballistic missile system with a quoted range of around 500 kilometres, flying a quasi-ballistic trajectory with terminal manoeuvring that complicates interception. The air-launched Kinzhal, carried by MiG-31K aircraft, and the Tsirkon, originally developed as a ship-launched hypersonic weapon, extend the threat set, while the Geran series of one-way attack drones, derived from the Iranian Shahed design, provides the volume in Russia’s strike packages. The US-made Patriot, particularly with the PAC-3 interceptor, has been the principal Ukrainian system capable of engaging ballistic targets since the first batteries arrived in spring 2023.
The official said Russian target sets shifted over time, ranging from Ukraine’s military-industrial complex to the recent targeting of grain shipments from southern ports, and warned the focus was likely to turn again with the seasons. Ukraine was “only three, potentially four months away from that flipping again back to Ukrainian energy” infrastructure for what the official called “the usual winter campaign against electricity and gas infrastructure.”
Russia has mounted a concerted campaign against Ukraine’s power grid in each winter of the full-scale war, striking generation, transmission and gas infrastructure with massed drone and missile salvoes. The attacks have at times caused rolling blackouts and forced Ukraine to import electricity from the EU, decentralise generation and harden substations, while air defence around energy sites has drawn heavily on interceptor stocks.
Ukrainian deep strikes were meanwhile becoming more effective in range, volume and target set, the official said, and Russia was struggling to defend against them. That inability was “notable, given the relative paucity in air defence” across the growing number of sites Russia had to protect, the official said.
Ballistic missiles are the biggest threat and some how in a £300 billion equipment plan we managed to assign just £750 million for Ballistic missile defence and not even looking to purchase a single launcher. The British army can never be a credible fighting force without this capability.
SDR 2025, discussions in the House of Commons, and, indeed, NATO itself indicate that Britain is relying on NATO for ballistic missile defence. An April 2026 article in the Financial Times points out the folly of such an approach.
‘…military experts question whether neighbouring Nato members could be relied on to use scarce and expensive interceptors — costing $3mn-$20mn — on incoming missiles that are not directly targeting them, particularly if they too were under attack….there is no formal agreement on shared missile defence.’
If Britain is unable to meet its NATO commitment of a formed two division army corps (and this country is unable to meet that commitment), why would we expect NATO countries to use their scarce anti ballistic missile defences to protect us?
SDR 2025, discussions in the House of Commons, and, indeed, NATO itself indicate that Britain is relying on NATO for ballistic missile defence. An April 2026 article in the Financial Times points out the folly of such an approach.
‘…military experts question whether neighbouring Nato members could be relied on to use scarce and expensive interceptors — costing $3mn-$20mn — on incoming missiles that are not directly targeting them, particularly if they too were under attack….there is no formal agreement on shared missile defence.’
If Britain is unable to meet its NATO commitment of a formed two division army corps (and this country is unable to meet that commitment), why would we expect NATO countries to use their scarce anti ballistic missile defences to protect us?