Here’s what a year of Russian missile attacks on Ukraine has looked like: Ukraine’s air defense systems have intercepted most of the missiles, but in recent months, more and more have been getting through.
April 2023
Interception
Russian missiles
May June July August September October November December January 2024 February March April
Data from a New York Times analysis of Ukraine’s daily military reports points to a major shift: Ukraine is increasingly failing to stop Russian missiles, crippling its ability to defend key infrastructure and plunging cities into darkness.
Russian airstrikes have hit key Ukrainian arms factories and railways used to supply the front line, as well as Ukrainian troops on the front line.
Ukraine is desperately pleading with its Western allies to beef up its air defenses, saying it is running out of critical supplies, but that’s only part of the problem: Russia has also changed tactics, launching massive artillery barrages that overwhelm Ukrainian air defenses and faster-moving missiles that are harder to shoot down.
Some attacks appear to be aimed at making life harder for civilians by hitting urban centers or destroying power plants, as was the case last week, cutting off electricity to tens of thousands of residents.
Fresh aid from Western countries could help: After a drawn-out political wrangling, the United States approved a $60 billion aid package last month that is already including more air defense missiles as part of the package.
But it could still be months before enough weapons arrive to significantly bolster Ukraine’s air defenses, and some issues are likely to remain even after the aid arrives, such as the use of more advanced Russian missiles.
The New York Times analyzed hundreds of statements made by the Ukrainian Air Force over the past year detailing the number and types of missiles fired by Russia and intercepted by Ukraine during that same period. While the data cannot be independently verified, experts who study the war say it is generally reliable.
Ukraine’s success during a renewed Russian missile attack last May was due in large part to its newly strengthened defenses: Ukraine had just received its first Patriot systems.
Considered one of America’s most advanced air defense weapons, the Patriot is equipped with a powerful radar system and mobile launchers to fire missiles at incoming warheads. Last May, Ukraine said it had used the system to shoot down a Russian hypersonic Kinzhal missile, one of the most advanced conventional weapons in the Kremlin’s arsenal.
The arrival of Patriot systems and other Western weapons has raised hopes that Ukrainian cities will be better protected. Allies have so far provided Ukraine with at least three Patriot systems and at least 15 air defense systems.
But when Russia stepped up its missile attacks again this winter, Ukraine was powerless to stop them.
Russia has refined its tactics, launching larger, more complex barrage attacks, including cruise, ballistic, and hypersonic missiles. Russia often begins its attacks with the launch of attack drones, followed by successive missiles from various locations, in an attempt to confuse and overwhelm Ukrainian defenses.
Russia, in particular, has increased its use of weapons that Ukraine has long struggled to intercept, such as the Iskander-M ballistic missile and Kh-22 missile.
But Ukrainian military commanders say the reason for Kiev’s plummeting interception rates is more fundamental: a worsening shortage of ammunition.
Last month, Russia destroyed the largest power plant in the Kiev region, one of the most heavily guarded areas in Ukraine thanks to its Patriot artillery batteries.
“Why? Because we had zero missiles,” Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said in an interview with the PBS NewsHour. “We ran out of missiles.”
By contrast, Russia fired 11 missiles at the nuclear plant, he said, and Ukrainian air defense forces shot down the first seven but missed the next four.
Military experts say Ukraine, struggling with ammunition shortages, is increasingly being forced to make such decisions in recent days, even if it means destruction and the death of its citizens.
“These are new rules of engagement,” said Tom Karako, director of the missile defense project at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington. “Sometimes you have to let things go. For example, you may have to protect your troops over your people.”
Ukrainian air force spokesman Major Ilya Yevrash said Russia had a large stockpile of S-300 missiles and it would be pointless to try to intercept them all.
“We can’t afford to deplete our precious air defense missile reserves,” he said. “If we try to shoot down the missiles, we won’t have enough Patriots.”
Ukraine has been much more successful at intercepting attack drones: According to Ukrainian Air Force data, the country has shot down about 80% of drones in the past year, most of them Shahed drones, because they are slower than missiles and can be shot down with less sophisticated weapons like anti-aircraft guns.
But Ukraine’s drone interception rate has declined as Russia has modified its drone fleet, changing flight patterns, increasing speeds and painting planes black to evade detection.
Konrad Muzyka, a military analyst at Poland-based firm Roshan Consulting, said Russia’s large, slow-moving reconnaissance drones have recently been able to operate behind Ukrainian military positions around the cities of Dnipro and Zaporizhia.
“If you can’t shoot it down, then obviously that raises serious questions about Ukraine’s ability to provide an air defence umbrella,” he said.
Ukraine needs to triage its air defenses, with some cities much more vulnerable than others, and Russia has taken full advantage of the situation in recent months, attacking cities and regions that lack the protection of patriots like Kiev.
Since December, Russian forces have targeted a vast area stretching from Kharkiv in the northeast to Odessa in the south, including western Ukraine, which escaped heavy bombardment for much of the war.
The minimum number of days each region was targeted by Russian attacks
Note: Russian missile and drone attacks are shown as reported by the Ukrainian Air Force. This does not include artillery fire on the front lines.
Yevlash said that with limited air defenses, the Ukrainian Air Force is using its weapons in “non-standard ways.” The air force is moving its weapons around the country to adapt to Moscow’s changing tactics and reduce the chances of them being detected and destroyed by Russian forces.
But that won’t be enough to plug a hole in a country the size of Texas, said Justin Bronk, senior fellow for air power and technology at the Royal Institute for Integrated Security Studies in London.
“Ukrainian commanders are constantly faced with extremely difficult choices: whether to defend critical national infrastructure, key military installations, cities and forces on or near the front line,” Bronk said.
Lacking defenses, Ukrainian drone hunters based in the devastated northeastern city of Kharkiv often have to watch helplessly as Russian missiles whizz by overhead towards the city.
“There are missiles that our troops can’t intercept with the weapons they have, and they’re just going to fly wherever they want,” said Barber, 23, a unit member who gave only his first name per military regulations. “That’s why we need the Patriot.”
Methodology
To build our dataset of Russian missile and drone attacks, The New York Times collected all statements posted by the Ukrainian Air Force on its Facebook page between April 1, 2023 and April 30, 2024. We used our AI model, GPT-4, to tally and categorize Russian missiles and drones reported by Ukraine, including their type, launch date, and whether they were intercepted. All data was manually checked to match the original posts.
In a few statements, Ukraine only stated the number of missiles it shot down, without mentioning how many Russia had launched. In these cases, it is possible that additional missiles were launched that were not recorded, and the indicated interception rate may be slightly lower.
Ukrainian Air Force statements refer to similar missile types collectively as “Kh-101/Kh-555/Kh-55 missiles” and “S-300/S-400 missiles.” For the purposes of this analysis, we group together the missile types Ukraine regularly describes together. In a few statements, Ukraine collectively refers to different missiles as “seven Iskander-M/S-300/S-400 missiles.” These missiles are included in the total number of missiles launched and intercepted, but not in the number of missile types.
The number of days that Ukrainian regions were targeted by Russian missile and drone attacks should be considered a minimum figure, as the Ukrainian statement did not say which regions were targeted.