Years of Western reluctance to help
Ukrainemodernize its Soviet-era air defenses have left the country dramatically vulnerable to a massive Russian bombing and missile campaign that could devastate Ukrainian forces before they ever see a hostile tank or soldier.
A confluence of concerns — fear of provoking Russia, worries the technology could fall into Russian hands, doubts Ukraine could operate the systems — prevented the U.S. and its allies from granting Ukrainian requests for sophisticated surface-to-air missiles in the years after Russia seized Crimea in 2014, current and former American officials and defense experts told NBC News.
Those calculations seemed reasonable at the time, yet they all but ensured Ukraine would be largely defenseless against what experts say would be an overwhelming display of air power should Russia mount a full-scale invasion. American officials are scrambling to find ways
to help Ukrainian forces preserve themselves, but there are few good options.
“We certainly all missed an opportunity,” said Philip Breedlove, a retired four-star Air Force general who was supreme allied commander of NATO during the 2014 Russian aggression, and was involved in the ensuing debate over how much aid to give Ukraine. “The West, NATO and all of the individual nations involved missed an opportunity. I think we’re looking at it in retrospect now and thinking maybe we should have made a different decision.”
Retired Adm. James Stavridis, who preceded Breedlove as NATO's supreme allied commander and is now an NBC News national security contributor, agreed.
“I think air defense would have been a very smart move,” he said. “If we had put more out there sooner, we would not be where we are now.”
As it stands, Russia is likely to begin any full-scale invasion with a lethal and largely unchallenged assault by bombers, ballistic missiles and artillery, said Dmitri Alperovitch, co-founder of the Silverado Policy Accelerator, a Washington, D.C., think tank.
“The shock and awe campaign they can launch with those resources against entrenched Ukrainian forces before the main ground invasion begins will be truly devastating," he said. “The Ukrainian military has no answer for these weapons.”
Decisions by American presidents of both parties set the stage. President Barack Obama declined to provide any lethal aid after Crimea fell in 2014, rejecting the recommendations of his most senior national security officials.
President Donald Trump signed off on the provision of Javelin anti-tank missiles only after delaying the aid package in an act that led to his impeachment. He didn’t provide air defense.
The Biden administration has been accused of being slow to act as well. By the time U.S. intelligence agencies concluded six months ago that Russia was planning for a possible invasion, there wasn’t enough time to train the Ukrainians to operate sophisticated air defenses such as Patriot missiles, Stavridis said.
“Over the last six months we were kind of at a dead sprint to put the right tools in their hands, but it was kind of too late,” Stavridis said. “There was just no time.”
