Trump refuses to transfer Patriot technology to Ukraine, citing risk of it being used against the US

US President Donald Trump has refused to transfer licenses for the production of interceptor missiles for Patriot air defense systems to Ukraine, saying such weapons could in the future be turned against America.

This was reported by The New York Times.

According to the outlet, Trump effectively walked back his promise, made in early July, to transfer to Ukraine licenses for the production of Patriot missiles. At a cabinet meeting on Friday, when asked about the agreement, he said there had been no such agreement.

“We didn’t agree to that,” Trump said, suggesting he had changed his mind because it is “hard to give away such technologies” and because of the risk that “the people you give the technologies to could one day turn against you.”

In this context, the NYT recalls that in the 1970s the United States supplied weapons to Iran shortly before the fall of the Shah’s regime. During the recent armed conflict between the US and Iran, American forces, according to the outlet, destroyed the last American fighter jets supplied to Tehran back in 1979, on the eve of the Islamic Revolution.

In addition to the political risks, the NYT points to the practical difficulties of implementing such a project. Establishing Patriot missile production in Ukraine would require the disclosure of classified defense technologies and cooperation between the manufacturers — Raytheon and Lockheed Martin — and the Ukrainian side. The entire process would take months or even years, and any production facilities built in Ukraine would immediately become targets for Russia.