Switzerland has suspended a scheduled payment to the United States for Patriot air defence systems, citing delivery delays. Washington is prioritising Ukraine and has not provided a binding timetable.
The Swiss Armed Forces already face procurement problems. Costs for the new F-35 fighter jets have risen, while deliveries of Israeli drones and US Patriots are delayed.
As the news platform Watson notes, in the event of an attack, only about 8% of Swiss airspace would be adequately protected.
Donnie keeps pressuring countries to buy American, but ignores that in many cases, the production capacity is not there.
He has already approved trade deal negotiations where countries have promised to buy far more energy than can be delivered.
The Defense Department (VBS) has stopped payments to the U.S. for the ordered Patriot air defense systems. This was confirmed by a spokesman for the Federal Office for Armament Armasuisse .
The U.S. government was supposed to deliver the first of the five Patriot systems to Switzerland from 2026. So it was stipulated three years ago. In July, however, the U.S. announced that the delivery would be delayed indefinitely: The U.S. Department of Defense is prioritizing the delivery of Patriot systems to Ukraine due to the war situation.
According to the usual terms of the contract, the U.S. could adjust the delivery priorities for security policy developments in foreign military sales, Armasuisse wrote at the request of this newspaper. Whether there are adjustments to the installment payments, is still to be clarified, it said in July.
Now Armasuisse has apparently made a decision: As the “Blick” reports, the Federal Office for Armaments has stopped the next installment payment to the USA, which would have been due in mid-September. By this summer, however, Switzerland had already made 650 million Swiss francs of down payments for the five Patriot systems, which cost a total of 2 billion Swiss francs.
It is a surprise that weapon manufacturers don’t increase production capacity. Plenty of customers around the world (map from the wiki).
"Lockheed is now fully funded by the U.S. Army to build 550 missiles a year at its Camden, Arkansas, production line. "
Countries order Patriots from the US Government, and in turn, they place orders with the manufacturers. If the Government does not place orders, then no more are built.
Countries are not allowed to order directly from manufacturers.
550 Patriot missiles a year is pathetic.
Russian fires enough missiles per day that Ukraine would happily use half a dozen daily.
19.09.2025 - As part of the “America First” agenda, the Department of Defense is stockpiling weapons.
The first clue that something had changed in the U.S. approach to selling military equipment to Europe came as Denmark neared a decision on the purchase of a multibillion-dollar air-defense system. For weeks, American and French negotiators had aggressively pursued the deal. But as the deadline approached, the Pentagon suddenly lost interest.
“We couldn’t understand why,” a contractor who had been tracking the discussions told me. “It seemed like a no-brainer, but they just weren’t into it.”
Then, on a call earlier this month with the State Department, Undersecretary of Defense for Policy Elbridge Colby said that he didn’t believe in the value of certain foreign military sales, according to two administration officials with knowledge of the discussion. He added that he didn’t like the idea of selling Patriots—which can intercept incoming missiles—to Denmark, because they are in short supply and should be reserved for the United States to use as needed. (The officials, like others I talked with, spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss this sensitive and evolving situation.)
The comments surprised some State officials, but they soon learned that it wasn’t just Denmark having its access cut off. Current and former administration officials told me the Pentagon has identified some weapons as being in short supply, and is moving to block new requests for those systems coming in from Europe. It wasn’t immediately clear to those I spoke with how long the hold will last, how many weapons are on the list, or if it could expand to include even more weapons. Few exemptions will be granted.
At $4-4.7 million for each missile. One Patriot battery usually includes multiple launchers (up to 8 in a typical U.S. Army configuration), giving a battery up to 64 missiles with older PAC-2 launchers or up to 128 missiles with PAC-3.
You do the math.
Drone warfare costs maybe a few hundred dollars each.
Switzerland did not allow Germany to sell Gepard ammunition to Ukraine a few years ago. Now they will have a possibility to check how good are Gepards in shooting Russian drones over Switzerland.
Patriot missiles are not used against drones, as far as I know. Nevertheless, to avoid drones flying over NATO countries Russian drone factory should have discontinued it’s existence the next night after the first drone crossed the border of NATO country. As well as 3 Russian fighter jets flying over Estonia for 12 minutes. It’s the only language that Putin understands.
Russia is a terrorist state that will terrorise the whole Europe as long as it is allowed to do so (especially now with Putinversteher in the White House). Russia, as the state it is now, should stop existing, it’s the only way to secure peace in Europe.
