Video published on Sunday showed the moment of impact from above as a loitering drone hit the side of the truck with devastating effect, sending smoke billowing from the wreckage.

Ukraine is urgently seeking more Patriot interceptors to defend against a nightly barrage of Russian ballistic missile strikes.

But the Iran war has drained arsenals in the US and the Gulf, and some European countries are holding onto missiles they may need for their own defense.

So what are the Patriot interceptor missiles?

Patriot, short for Phased Array Tracking Radar for Intercept on Target, is a mobile surface-to-air missile defense system built by US weapons maker Raytheon Technologies that can be used in all kinds of weather and at long range.

A typical battery includes radar and control systems, a power unit, launchers, and support vehicles. The system can intercept aircraft, tactical ballistic missiles and cruise missiles, depending on the interceptor used.

Kyiv has repeatedly asked Western allies for more air defences to protect critical infrastructure and civilian areas from frequent Russian missile and drone attacks.

While effective at intercepting missiles and aircraft, Patriots are a costly way to shoot down low-budget drones. Patriot interceptors are estimated at around $4 million per missile, CSIS says, while Russia can send hundreds of cheap drones a day.

Although not originally designed to intercept hypersonic weapons, in May 2023 the US confirmed Ukraine had used the Patriot system to shoot down a Russian Kinzhal missile, which Moscow claims is hypersonic.

Russia has long said that giving Ukraine interceptors would amount to a direct escalation. They said it would delay the chance of peace.

But Donald Trump’s main line of argument is that the US needs its weapons and cannot afford to give them away to Ukraine. Indeed, the Patriots have been in short supply since the US went to war with Iran in February.

Trump in July offered Ukraine the right to make its own Patriot interceptors, but later reneged, saying the US has “not agreed” to such an arrangement.

The Ukrainian capital Kyiv came under attack from Russian ballistic missiles early on Tuesday, Mayor Vitali Klitschko said.

Witnesses reported explosions in the capital.

Local officials have been issued recruitment quotas by the Kremlin and Moscow’s defence ministry as it looks to meet this year’s 409,000 target, sources familiar with the matter told the Financial Times.

The development signals a significant recalibration of Moscow’s military footprint in the region.

The Hmeimem air base and the Tartus naval base served as crucial Russian military outposts in the eastern Mediterranean throughout Syria’s civil war.

Russia was the primary political and military ally of former president Bashar al-Assad, who was ousted in December 2024 by Isis-affiliated insurgents led by now-leader Ahmad al-Sharaa, known by the nom de guerre Abu Mohammed al-Jolani, and subsequently sought exile in Russia.

In his evening address, Zelensky reiterates his claim that North Korea is preparing to send tens of thousands of troops to train in Russia.

He also says Pyongyang has sent ballistic missiles to Moscow to aid the war effort.

“For the first time in its history, Russia cannot wage war without reinforcements from North Korea,” the Ukrainian president assessed.

“The more North Korean strikes there are here in Ukraine, in Europe, the more their missiles and soldiers are used, the more they correct their shortcomings and blind spots, the greater the danger will later be for Japan, the Republic of Korea, the Philippines, and other countries in the region.”

Volodymyr Zelensky said he had discussed a drone deal and food security with Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman on Monday.

“There are domains in which Ukraine and Saudi Arabia can strengthen each other’s ability to protect lives and people,” he said on X after the call.

Russia’s war on Ukraine has entered its latest phase, with each side making use of increasing numbers of long-range munitions to strike deep into the other’s territory.

In the early summer of this year, there was a surge of optimism across the media when it became clear that Ukraine was stepping up its strikes at enormous ranges into Russia, and there was little that Moscow could do about it. But that optimism needs to be balanced against the new reality that with anti-missile interceptor systems exhausted, there is not much Ukraine itself can do to blunt Russian missile attacks. For now, those attacks sow misery and death by blasting residential areas with little warning: but next winter, they could once again target heating and power infrastructure and have an even more devastating effect on Ukraine’s ability to keep its people alive than last year.