Romania intends to buy US Patriot missiles

Chief of Staff, general Nicolae Ciuca has announced in a press conference in Smârdan on Thursday that Romania intends to buy American Patriot missiles, within the army endowment project.  A joint Romanian-American military exercise is ongoing in Smârdan.

Ciuca voiced his optimism that the acquisition procedures cand be kicked off this year. Defense secretary of state Florin Vladica also stated that a request to the US Embassy in Bucharest had been sent, with Romania expressing its intention to buy the Patriot missiles. The request is to reach the American Government.

Patriot is a long-range, all-altitude, all-weather air defence system to counter tactical ballistic missiles, cruise missiles and advanced aircraft. The system is based on a mobile trailer that can be transported by C5 Galaxy aircrafts. Its components are interoperable so that NATO member states can cooperate in assembling a defense system which can be set up in farway region, like the Turkish-Syrian border for instance.

Another 12 countries have Patriot missiles: USA, the Netherlands, Germany, Japan, Israel, Saudi Arabia, Kuweit, Taiwan, Greece, Spain, South Korea and United Arab Emirates.

Last year in November, several Patriot missiles arrived in Romania in the context of PATRIOT SHOCK V military exercise, which took place in Capul Midia during November 5-10.

The American soldiers in Germany have conducted the first part of the exercise, respectively they mounted the missile battery from Germany to be transported by rail to Romania.

It was for the first time a set of Patriot missiles arrive in Romania. The system can detect about 100 targets and can guide up to nine missiles.

PATRIOT SHOCK V was a Romanian-US bilateral exercise, of tactical troop level in the field of surface-to-air structures of the Romanian Air Forces, which includes a HAWK PIP III R battery and a PATRIOT battery.

The purpose of the exercise wass to train the HAWK PIP III R battery crews for employing air operation targets through integration with the PATRIOT battery under a fictitious air defence scenario.