Ukraine needs 5% of US Patriot missiles, Zelensky says

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said Ukraine needs the United States to sell it 5% of its Patriot interceptor missile stocks to get through winter and save lives.

In a CNN interview published Thursday, Zelensky said 10% of US Patriot interceptor stocks would let Ukraine destroy all Russian ballistic missiles. He said Ukraine currently had 1%.

“This year, I'm asking American partners to sell me five percent of missiles they have in their stocks,” Zelensky said in English. He said Ukraine this year had “two-and-a-half times less interceptors” than in 2025, while Russia had twice as many ballistic missiles per month as before.

Ukraine has reported an acute shortage of Patriot interceptors since the United States and Israel went to war with Iran in February, diverting supplies of the advanced systems.

Russia has recently fired mass barrages at Kyiv roughly once a week, killing civilians and damaging or destroying homes. In one attack, Ukraine failed to intercept any of the 28 ballistic missiles launched at it.

Ukraine's air force said Wednesday it would stop publishing detailed figures on Russian ballistic missile strikes, including numbers launched, shot down, suppressed or failing to reach targets. Communications chief Yuriy Ignat said real-time warnings would continue and the air force would keep providing generalised figures on Russian missile launches.

Last month, Russia fired more than 450 missiles at Ukraine, nearly 200 of them on ballistic trajectories.