4 days ago
Russia's missile salvoes stretch US defenses from Kyiv to Taipei
Russia's missiles are outpacing Ukraine's defenses—and the implications reach well beyond Europe. From South Korea to Taiwan, the US and its allies face the same looming test: intercepting smarter, faster salvos before magazines run dry.
That picture is already visible in Ukraine, where the US Special Inspector General's latest quarterly report says Kyiv is struggling to stop Russian ballistic missiles because Moscow has adapted its missile tactics in ways that strain Western-supplied air defense systems.
The Special Inspector General's report notes that Russia has incorporated trajectory-shifting capabilities and mid-course maneuvering into its missiles, preventing them from flying along traditional, predictable arcs that systems like the US-made Patriot are designed to intercept.
Those adaptations have coincided with sharply worse outcomes. In a June 28 attack, Ukrainian forces shot down only one of seven incoming ballistic missiles, while during a massed July 9 strike—the largest since the war began—Ukraine managed to down or suppress just seven of 13 ballistic missiles, according to the same Inspector General report.
The battlefield math is compounded by saturation tactics: hundreds of drones and missiles launched in overlapping waves, forcing Ukraine to spread already limited interceptors thin. Ukrainian defenses, though bolstered by Western deliveries, remain insufficient in scale, and pauses in US assistance have further weakened readiness.
The inability to consistently intercept maneuvering ballistic missiles carries broader consequences. Those lessons resonate in the Indo-Pacific, where North Korea and China are integrating similar technologies into their arsenals, suggesting that Ukraine's struggles foreshadow what US allies such as South Korea, Japan or Taiwan might face in a barrage.
North Korea may be an indirect beneficiary of Russia's campaign. Starting in December 2023, Russia has fired North Korean ballistic missiles at Ukraine, with the accuracy of those systems improving from one–three kilometers to 50–100 meters Circular Error Probable (CEP) in February 2025.
The contours of that threat were sketched out earlier. Stéphane Delory and others note in a 2022 report for the Hague Code of Conduct (HCoC) against the Proliferation of Ballistic Missiles that the KN-23, KN-24, and KN-25 give North Korea a formidable short-range strike arsenal designed with defense penetration in mind.
Delory and others note that the KN-23 and KN-24 employ quasi-ballistic flight paths and skipping maneuvers, allowing erratic terminal-phase changes that complicate interception, while the KN-25 can fly at low trajectories to reduce exposure to defenses.
At the same time, they note North Korea has expanded its production infrastructure, including facilities for solid propellants and transporter-erector-launchers (TEL), giving it the capacity to manufacture and field these systems at scale.
The combination of maneuverability and mass production creates a credible saturation threat, with the potential to overwhelm the limited interceptor inventories available to Seoul and Tokyo in a crisis.
Taiwan faces a similar problem, with the added factor that China—whose economy is many times larger than those of Russia and North Korea—could deploy more advanced missile types and in greater quantities than either.
Noting Taiwan's significant missile defense gaps, Tianran Xu mentions in an April 2025 Open Nuclear Network report that despite operating 21 Patriot Advanced Capability (PAC) and Tien Kung batteries, Taipei faces a severe interceptor shortfall, with only ~380 PAC-3 Cost Reduction Initiative (CRI) missiles and limited PAC-3 Missile Segment Enhancement (MSE) deliveries expected by 2026.
Xu contrasts this shortfall by saying that the People's Liberation Army (PLA) fields over 900 short-range ballistic missiles (SRBM), air-launched ballistic missiles (ALBM), and hundreds of guided rockets, overwhelming Taipei's ability to sustain layered defense.
He also points out that the dual-use of surface-to-air missiles (SAM) against both aircraft and missiles strains stockpiles, while reliance on high-value interceptors for low-cost threats accelerates depletion.
US missile-defense units—overstretched and undersupplied—could be hard-pressed to defend US bases in South Korea and Japan, and current production rates may be insufficient to prepare Taiwan to stand up to a concerted effort to exhaust its defenses under blockade.
The War Zone (TWZ) mentions in July 2025 that the US Army's Patriot force is critically overstretched, with only 14 deployable battalions strained by prolonged global deployments, including a 500-day rotation in CENTCOM.
TWZ notes this thin distribution leaves just three battalions assigned to the Indo-Pacific, raising strategic concerns should conflict erupt with China or North Korea.
It also states that the recent redeployment of a Patriot unit from the Pacific to Qatar underscores the vulnerability of US forces in South Korea and Japan, where layered missile defense is vital.
Industrial capacity is not keeping pace with demand. Business Insider reports this month that while US manufacturing is ramping rapidly—with Lockheed Martin expected to surpass 600 PAC-3 MSE interceptors this year and Raytheon increasing output of PAC-2 and Guidance Enhanced Missile (GEM-T)—global demand remains relentless, fueled by growing threats from Russia, Iran, and China.
Business Insider points out that despite industry investments and expanded supply chains, production timelines lag operational needs. The report warns that even if projected output increases to 1,130 interceptors by 2027, it may fall short in a high-intensity conflict.
Near term, Washington could still push for greater allied self-sufficiency by easing export controls, expanding licensing, and selectively sharing technology rather than relying exclusively on US-made Patriots.
Japan's Type 03 Chu-SAM is the most realistic candidate for scaling, as US financing and access to critical subsystems would accelerate an already mature, indigenous program.
South Korea's KM-SAM could benefit from targeted cooperation, though Seoul's preference for autonomy and industrial competition with US firms may limit the depth of collaboration.
Taiwan's Tien Kung, by contrast, is far more constrained by political sensitivities with China, making discreet US component support more plausible than overt funding or technology transfer.
Washington and its allies are also pursuing alternatives that could ease the arithmetic of defense. The US and its partners are accelerating the development of directed-energy weapons such as lasers and high-power microwaves, while railguns could also help address interceptor shortages, but adoption will depend on how quickly weight, power, cooling, durability, and cost issues are resolved.
Even if those hurdles are cleared, such systems would not arrive as a silver bullet. They would enter mixed defensive networks that still depend on kinetic interceptors for many targets, and any transition would have to be paced against mounting operational demands.
The convergence of missile threats in Europe, the Middle East, and the Indo-Pacific shows that no theater exists in isolation. Missile adaptations tested in Ukraine echo in North Korea's barrages and point toward China's far larger and more sophisticated arsenal, while US forces juggle finite interceptors across three fronts. Missile defense is no longer a regional problem but a global stress test of US strategy.
Unless Washington moves decisively to expand production, build allied capacity and advance technological solutions, adversaries will keep exploiting seams between these conflicts — stretching US defenses toward a breaking point.
