In light of the current war in Ukraine, the US military command in Europe announced the dispatch of two Patriot surface-to-air missile batteries to Poland, the neighbor on the border with Ukraine, to confront any potential threat to any NATO member from Russia.
The Patriot system protects military installations and air bases from air attacks, and the basis of its work is long-term defense, and it can hit air targets at a range of 160 km, and ballistic missiles at a range of 75 km.
Origin and development
October 1964: The Minister of Defense changes the name of the Army's air defense program to the development of a surface-to-air missile.
1975: The SAM-D missile was successfully tested after it clashed with a mock target.
1976: The system was renamed the Patriot Air Defense System.
1976: The development of the system began on a large scale.
1984: The Patriot air defense system is deployed.
Patriot systems have been sold to Taiwan, Egypt, Germany, Greece, Israel, Japan, Kuwait, the Netherlands, Saudi Arabia, Spain, the United Arab Emirates, Qatar, Romania, South Korea, Jordan and Oman.
July 2001: The US Army announced that an experiment was conducted on an upgraded version of the Patriot anti-missile system to destroy a drone and a ballistic missile simultaneously, and the experiment recorded two different results, one successful and the other failed.
The Army clarified that the Patriot "PEC3" system equipped with several missiles succeeded in hitting the remotely piloted aircraft, but it missed its target with respect to the ballistic missile during a test conducted at the White Sands Missile Range training site. Sands Missile Range) in the state of New Mexico (southwest of the United States).
The BEC3 system is a high-speed travel missile system to intercept and destroy low-range missiles, cruise missiles, and aircraft.
surface-to-air missile system
The Patriot is a surface-to-air missile system manufactured by the American company Raytheon and designed to protect against attacking missiles and aircraft, as it hits them and detonates them in the air before they reach their targets.
The Patriot missile is designed to intercept a number of hostile missiles and air threats, including ballistic missiles that can carry chemical, nuclear or biological warheads.
The Patriot has replaced the Nike-Hercules high and medium defense system and the MIM-23 Hawk tactical medium defense system, as well as its role as a TBM system, It is his main task at the present time.
They are high-tech guided missiles that rely on their own ground-based radar system to detect and track the target, as the radar scans a circle with a diameter of 80 km, and at this distance the attacking missile is not visible to the naked eye, and here the automatic system can launch a counter-missile towards the aggressor missile It explodes before it reaches its target.
It consists of 4 parts, which are the radar vehicle, the control room, and the missile platform, in addition to the missiles themselves.
The radar in this system can detect 50 targets simultaneously, and within 9 seconds its signal reaches the control room, which assesses the danger and decides to launch the missiles.
It protects military installations and air bases from air attacks, and the basis of its work is long-term defense.
It can hit air targets at a range of 160 km, and ballistic missiles at a range of 75 km.
It operates at an altitude range between 60 meters and 15 kilometers.
It takes 9 seconds to launch the first missile after detecting the threat.
The Patriot system "PAC-3 MSI" can launch 16 missiles at once, each of which is 5 meters long, and carries an explosive warhead weighing 73 kilograms.
The radar system equipped with Patriot missiles uses modern technology based on an omni-directional antenna, as this system can track the path of 100 targets and control the path of 9 Patriot missiles at the same moment.
The launch pad contains 16 launchers carrying a Patriot missile, and each launcher is connected to the control system through optical fibers or through radio communication, and the control system is the one that sends the instructions to launch the missiles.
The Patriot missile is of two types, the first type is the old one called "PAC-2" and the second type
PAC-3, the newer variant that appeared in 2002.
The second type of Patriot "PAC-3" is equipped with a radar receiver and a computer to control the guidance of the Patriot towards the target, and here the Patriot has to collide directly with the target through the missile's radar receiving information from the platform's radar, and accordingly the missile computer controls the guidance wings so that the Patriot missile reaches target and hit it.
When did the Patriots enter Poland?
August 2008: The United States and Poland sign an agreement to establish a Patriot center in Poland to deter ballistic missiles.
October 2009: The United States says it has informed Poland that it may be one of the sites where it will deploy interceptor missiles in 2010 under President Barack Obama's revised plans for missile defense in Europe.
Prior to that, Poland had repeatedly complained that it does not host American forces or large military facilities on its soil, despite being a member of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) for 10 years, and has supported American missions in Afghanistan and Iraq.
December 11, 2009: Polish and US officials sign an agreement regulating the stationing of US forces and military equipment on Polish soil.
This step is a prerequisite for the deployment of US Patriot missiles, which will be used to train the Polish army.
The so-called Status of Forces agreement allows for about 100 US troops to be stationed in Poland as part of a shield that will include SM3 Patriot missiles.
December 12, 2009: Polish Defense Minister Bogdan Klić announced that the United States will install a Patriot missile base in his country in March 2010.
Patriots in the Middle East
1991: In the Gulf War and during Operation Desert Storm, the Patriot's mission was to intercept Iraqi "Hussein" short-range ballistic missiles fired at Israel and Saudi Arabia.
Despite Israel's deployment of Patriot missile batteries during the second Gulf War, Tel Aviv was hit by 39 Scud missiles fired by Baghdad, and the Iraqi bombing led to two deaths and hundreds of injuries.
August 2002: Maariv newspaper reported that Israel had deployed a battery of Patriot anti-missile missiles near the Dimona nuclear complex in the Negev desert (southern Israel).
August 2010: The administration of US President Barack Obama notifies Congress of its intention to sell Kuwait the latest version of the Patriot missile interceptor in order to strengthen the network of integrated defenses aimed at thwarting what the United States sees as a threat to Kuwait.
- The Defense and Security Cooperation Agency of the US Department of Defense (the Pentagon) said in a notification to Congress that Kuwait is seeking to obtain 209 Patriot guided missiles, in a deal worth $900 million.
February 2013: German Chancellor Angela Merkel, at the beginning of her visit to Turkey, inspected the Patriot missile batteries that Berlin had deployed in the Kahramanmaras region of eastern Turkey, near the Syrian border.
November 2014: The Israeli army deployed Patriot missiles in Haifa and other cities to counter the missiles of the Lebanese Hezbollah.
Just one day after Germany announced the end of its military presence on Turkish soil within the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), the United States decided to withdraw the Patriot anti-missile system from Turkish territory.
2017: Turkey decided to buy the S-400 system from Russia, after its prolonged efforts to purchase Patriot air defense systems from the United States faltered.
March 2018: Jeffrey Lewis, director of the James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies at the Middlebury Institute in California, USA, said that the Patriot "PAC-2" system - which was deployed in Saudi Arabia - is not well designed to intercept the "Burkan-2" missiles fired by it. The Houthis are on Riyadh, as it flies for a distance of 900 kilometers, and it appears that it carries a warhead that is separated from the missile itself.
Lewis also greatly doubted that the Patriots had intercepted a long-range ballistic missile in combat, and according to investigations by the House Committee on Government Operations, there was insufficient evidence to conclude that there were any objections. The American Defense has lifted the confidentiality of information about the performance of these missiles - Al-Nour.
July 2019: Turkey received the first batch of the Russian "S-400", which provoked sharp US reactions that amounted to a threat to impose sanctions on Ankara.
May 2019: Acting US Defense Secretary Patrick Shanahan approved the deployment of additional Patriot missiles in the Middle East, in light of tension with Iran, without specifying the number of these missiles.
March 2020: Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said that the United States was softening its position on a possible US Patriot defense system deal, and revealed that Washington had asked Ankara to ensure that it would not operate the Russian S-400 defense system.
Ankara asked Washington to deploy Patriot missiles on its border with Syria to protect it after the escalation of fighting in Idlib Governorate (northwestern Syria).
Washington has expressed its readiness to provide ammunition to Turkey for use in its military operations in Idlib, and said that it is assessing Ankara's request to deploy the Patriot system.
June 2021: The American Wall Street Journal revealed that the administration of President Joe Biden decided to reduce a large number of American anti-missile systems (Patriot) in the Middle East, and reported that Washington decided to withdraw 8 Patriot batteries from Iraq, Kuwait, Jordan and Saudi Arabia.
September 2021: The American "Associated Press" reported that the United States withdrew its latest missile defense systems and Patriot missile batteries from Saudi Arabia weeks ago.
The same agency reported that satellite images showed the removal of some American missile batteries from Prince Sultan Air Base (115 km southeast of Riyadh), and added that a high-resolution image of Planet Labs showed that the battery platforms at the site were empty and without any Visual activity.
January 2022: The British Financial Times reports that Saudi Arabia has asked Gulf states to help it build up its stockpile of anti-missiles used in the Patriot system, with the escalation of attacks by the Houthi group with missiles and drones.
February 2022: The US Department of Defense (the Pentagon) said that its forces used Patriot missiles to help the UAE intercept the ballistic missile launched by the Houthis, coinciding with the visit of Israeli President Isaac Herzog to Abu Dhabi.