What is the Patriot missile system?
Chris Partridge
Weapons analyst
Last night, Donald Trump confirmed that the US would send Patriot missile defence systems to Ukraine, as part of a shipment of military equipment.
The missiles are not a silver bullet, but they are extremely capable, effective and expensive.
One Patriot missile costs around $3m - three times the cost of a missile in a NASAMS (National Advanced Surface-to-Air Missile System).
Patriots were used against Iraq's Russian-made Scud missiles during the first Gulf War and have been continuously developed since by Raytheon Technologies.
They come in batteries that include a command centre, a radar station to detect incoming threats - and launchers.
Ranges to target reportedly vary between 40km to 160km (100 miles), depending on the type of missile used - and they are what's termed "point defence" systems: generally designed to defend particular areas such as cities or important infrastructures.
In other words high-value assets.
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