Overview

• President Volodymyr Zelenskyy urged about 50 contact-group nations in Brussels to speed up U.S. Patriot battery shipments and close an $18 billion weapons procurement gap.
• Germany launched a fresh initiative to raise over €1 billion for additional air-defense systems and offered to pay allies directly for Patriot batteries to accelerate delivery.
• U.K. Defense Secretary John Healey pledged a tenfold increase in drone production to bolster Ukraine’s battlefield capabilities.
• British officials reported Russia is launching more than 300 drones daily into Ukraine, a tempo that could persist into 2025 and strain Kyiv’s defenses.
• U.S. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth’s absence marked the first time a Pentagon chief has skipped a Ukraine Defense Contact Group meeting since its creation in 2022.