Dutch analyst Patrick Bolder believes that Ukraine needs an international "security umbrella" under which missiles and drones that do not belong to Ukraine would be intercepted by a coalition of partner states.
Bolder, a strategic analyst and defense expert at the Hague Center for Strategic Studies (HCSS) and a former lieutenant colonel in the Royal Netherlands Air Force, expressed this view in a comment to Ukrinform, commenting on Ukraine's growing shortage of air defense capabilities.
According to the expert, Russia is increasingly exploiting the shortage of air defense missiles to carry out massive ballistic strikes on Ukrainian cities, while delays in decisions on supplying Patriot systems are only increasing Ukraine's vulnerability.
Bolder said that the situation demonstrated how critical the shortage of air defense missiles had become and how serious the situation was when the United States failed to supply Patriot missiles to Ukraine. He stressed that Ukraine was effectively being left to fend for itself by the United States and that European countries needed to become much more actively involved in defending it. He added that this was particularly important given the missiles and drones that had entered Polish and Romanian airspace in recent days. In his view, this required a much stronger response from NATO countries.
