Russia has a shortage of the air defense missiles it needs to fight drones: Ukraine's military chief
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One of Russia's primary weapons against Ukraine's drones is the Pantsir missile system. GIUSEPPE CACACE/AFP via Getty Images 2026-04-27T07:12:23.362Z Share Copy link Email Facebook WhatsApp X LinkedIn Bluesky Threads lighning bolt icon An icon in the shape of a lightning bolt.
Impact Link Save Saved Read in app This story is available exclusively to Business Insider subscribers. Become an Insider and start reading now. Have an account? Log in. Oleksandry Syrskyi said Russia is facing a shortage of air defense missiles for drones. Ukraine is trying to exhaust Russia's air defenses this year with a long-range strike campaign. Analysts and Russian military bloggers have warned that the Kremlin's defenses are overstretched. AI-generated summary Summaries are generated by an AI model trained on Business Insider's articles. AI may make mistakes or provide inaccurate/incomplete information. We're unable to load that answer right now. Please try again. How does drone warfare impact defenses? Why are Russia's defenses overstretched? What are Russia's options for missile shortages? What are Pantsir missile systems? How is Ukraine targeting Russian defenses? Ukraine's commander in chief has said that Russia is running low on air defense missiles to counter drone strikes, suggesting that Moscow shares some of the West's stockpile concerns as the air war evolves. Loading audio narration... Oleksandr Syrskyi, the head of the Ukrainian military, made the remark during a meeting with Canada's defense chief in Kyiv on Sunday."I noted that systematic strikes on Russian production facilities further degrade the enemy's air defense capabilities, which are already experiencing a shortage of missiles to counter Ukrainian unmanned systems and strike assets," Syrskyi wrote in a statement. Syrskyi's comment comes as militaries around the world are scrambling for a new response to the growing use of long-range attack drones, which are cheap, expendable, and a poor target for more expensive traditional missiles.Now, his assessment indicates that an intensifying Ukrainian strike campaign is forcing Moscow into the same dilemma. Ukraine has been regularly reporting dozens of long-range strikes per month on Russian soil, using drones and missiles to damage energy and military infrastructure behind the border.More recently, the country's security service branch said it struck Russia's Black Sea Fleet naval base in Sevastopol and the Belbek airfield in Crimea on Sunday. The Washington-based think tank Institute for the Study of War (ISW) wrote in a Sunday assessment that Ukraine has been steadily increasing the tempo of its strikes across Russia, and "will likely continue to exploit the large attack surface area of Russia's deep rear and overstretched Russian air defenses."The think tank recorded at least 10 Ukrainian reports of long-range strikes against Russian infrastructure in the last two weeks. Russia is known to primarily use Pantsir point defense missile systems against drone threats, but their interceptors take much longer to produce than drones. Ukraine also said in February that it had destroyed at least half of Russia's Pantsir systems. In early April, one of Russia's most prominent military blogger organizations, Rybar, wrote of concerns that Ukraine was waging "a protracted campaign to penetrate Russian air defenses" until the summer of 2026."Simply fabricating tens of thousands of Pantsir missiles out of thin air is physically impossible," the popular commentary site wrote, adding that Russian antiaircraft missile forces were being stretched "to the limit and expending ammunition at an accelerated rate." Rybar suggested that Russia adopt a counterdrone strategy like Ukraine's, including an emphasis on mobile fire groups and interceptor drone crews.Analysts at the London-based Royal United Services Institute also wrote in a December report that Russia was expending air defense interceptors faster than it could produce them, and was rapidly trying to bolster manufacturing. The shortage was "overwhelmingly concentrated in older or obsolete platforms such as 9K33 Osa and SHORAD systems, especially Pantsir," the analysts added.The US has burned through much of its air defense interceptors during its war with Iran, with RUSI analysts reporting that it spent 11,300 munitions in 16 days of combat alone. Some of the gravest concerns extend to stockpiles of higher-end interceptors, such as Patriot missiles, Terminal High Altitude Area Defense interceptors, and ship-launched Standard Missile interceptors.