Patriots to move to Kyiv 'as quickly as possible', says NATO top commander

By Sabine Siebold

WIESBADEN, Germany (Reuters) - Preparations are underway to quickly transfer additional Patriot air defence systems to Ukraine, NATO's top military commander Alexus Grynkewich said on Thursday, as the country suffers some of the heaviest Russian attacks of the war so far.

"We are working very closely with the Germans on the Patriot transfer", he told a conference in the German city of Wiesbaden. "The guidance that I have been given has been to move out as quickly as possible."

U.S. President Donald Trump this week announced a toughened stance against Russia for its more than three-year war in Ukraine and promised new missiles and other weaponry for Kyiv.

He said on Tuesday that some Patriot missiles, coming from Germany, were already on their way to Ukraine.

A meeting of Patriot-owning nations and Ukraine donors, aimed at finding additional Patriot air defence batteries for Kyiv and chaired by Grynkewich, could take place on Wednesday next week, a source close to the talks told Reuters.

The expert level meeting is expected to be held at NATO's military headquarters SHAPE near the Belgian town of Mons, according to the source.

Grynkewich said there was also an issue of sequence with regard to deliveries to Ukraine.

"Secretary (of State Marco) Rubio just talked about capabilities that are in Europe (which) can be moved more quickly than something coming off the production line", Grynkewich noted.

"But the production line can then be used to backfill the capabilities that others donate."

He said he had no sense of what number of Patriot systems might be freed up for delivery to Kyiv. "There will be a lot more to follow, we're going to move as quickly as we can on this," he said.

After a meeting with U.S. Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth in Washington on Monday, German Defence Minister Boris Pistorius said a decision on supplying two U.S.-made Patriot systems to Kyiv could be reached within days or weeks. Germany has already donated three of its own Patriot units to Kyiv.

Ukraine treasures the Patriot system, built by U.S. defence company Raytheon, as its most valuable means to intercept ballistic and hypersonic missiles fired by Russia.

(Reporting by Sabine Siebold; Editing by Bart Meijer and Ros Russell)