Pentagon looking for additional NASAMS for Ukraine in Middle East – media

Greg Hayes, CEO of Raytheon Technologies, which produces National Advanced Surface to Air Missile Systems, said Thursday, Ukrinform reports with reference to Defense One.

As noted, the deal would allow Ukraine to avoid a two-year wait for new ones from Raytheon’s factory.

“The DOD is going to attempt to do some trading for us where we'll take some from the Middle Eastern countries that are our friends and some from our NATO allies, and try and get those into Ukraine early next year. Then we'll backfill [those countries] with new production over the next two years,” the CEO said.

Hayes did not mention specific countries.

NASAMS are operated by five NATO members—Hungary, Lithuania, Netherlands, Norway, and Spain—and Oman and Qatar in the Middle East, according to Forecast International. Australia, Chile, Finland, and Indonesia also operate the system.

Earlier, the Pentagon awarded Raytheon a $1.2 billion contract for the remaining six of eight NASAMS interceptors promised by the Biden administration.

“This is gonna take us a full two years to fulfill this contract. Unfortunately, there's no magic box that allows us to just build them every day,” Hayes said

As reported, the Armed Forces of Ukraine have already put several NASAMS on combat duty. Moreover, in the first days of combat use, the systems demonstrated 100 percent efficiency, shooting down ten Russian missiles out of ten.

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