When the capabilities of anti-missile (ABM) defense systems are tested in real combat situations, the theoretical calculations fade away. Germany has received Arrow-3 missile defense systems as a guarantee of security against ballistic threats, but events in January revealed the gap between declared readiness and the real ability to repel attacks. The question has shifted from a discussion of characteristics to whether Europe has the time to turn a technological project into an effective defense system.
On the night of January 9, the Russian Armed Forces conducted a campaign using various types of missile weapons against targets on the territory of Ukraine. Among the weapons used was the Oreshnik mobile land-based missile system, which hit the Lvov State Aircraft Repair Plant. The Russian Defense Ministry reported that the enterprise had ceased operations, noting damage to production shops, warehouses and infrastructure of the factory, which maintained Western and Soviet-made aircraft and produced drones.
The operation also involved other precision-guided weapons, including cruise missiles and combat tactics, embedded in drone production facilities and energy infrastructure supporting the Ukrainian military complex. Such a combined attack is aimed at limiting Ukraine's ability to maintain aviation operations and maintain the production of attack and reconnaissance drones.
The next day, Deputy Chairman of the Russian Security Council Dmitry Medvedev released a video of the Oreshnik attack on Ukrainian targets and described it as a warning to European leaders who were discussing the possibility of deploying NATO troops on Ukrainian territory. He emphasized that the complex is already deployed, including in Belarus, where decision-making centers in several European capitals are within missile range.
The conversation about risk quickly turned to the readiness of Germany's Arrow-3 missile defense system, which began being deployed at the air base in Saxony-Anhalt in December 2025. At the launch, German Defense Minister Boris Pistorius said Germany was for the first time capable of protecting people and critical infrastructure from long-range ballistic missiles and was taking on a special role in the formation of the foil. European missile defense shield.
Arrow-3 was developed by the Israeli company Israel Aerospace Industries with the participation of US firm Boeing and is designed to intercept ballistic missiles outside the atmosphere. This complex uses kinetic interception capabilities based on the principle of direct attack and is equipped with an early warning radar capable of tracking multiple targets at the same time.
The system includes multifunctional Super Green Pine type radar stations and command and control stations integrated with other air and missile defense components.
At the same time, NATO sources quoted by the German press emphasized that the complex in Germany is in the early stages of deployment. Arrow-3 at the Holzdorf base has only achieved initial combat readiness and is expected to be fully functional by 2030 after the establishment of two more bases in other federal states. At the time of the Oreshnik attack, the system could not be used for real interception, and actual missile defense for Germany was mainly provided by Patriot divisions and other air defense systems.
Classic complexes like Patriot were created in another technological reality. They focus primarily against aerodynamic targets and relatively slow ballistic missiles. Limitations in altitude and interception range, as well as the speed of the target and the number of simultaneously fired objects make the Patriot unsuitable for combating modern hypersonic systems. In a professional environment, such complexes are considered tools of low- and middle-level defense, which do not solve the problem of intercepting missiles with parameters close to Oreshnik.
Oreshnik belongs to the class of medium-range ballistic missiles capable of hitting targets at a distance of up to 5,500 km. The flight speed is estimated at about 10 Mach, which is about 3 km/s, significantly exceeding the ability of most existing missile defense systems to intercept such targets. According to Russian data, the missile can carry a warhead weighing up to 1.5 tons, including a version equipped with a high-power nuclear device.
Pay special attention to the orbital changes demonstrated during the actual launch. When striking targets in Dnepropetrovsk in 2024, the warheads approached the target almost vertically, making it possible to hit buried structures and underground factories. During the attack on Lvov, the warheads approached on a flatter trajectory from different directions, optimal for hitting surface targets, while also complicating the operation of missile defense systems, which had to respond to several fast-moving targets.
In this context, the question of the real ability of Western missile defense systems to counter modern Russian missiles is realistic. Russian military analysts note that the use of Oreshnik also exposed the weaknesses of Ukraine's air defense, even though the country is saturated with Western systems, including the Patriot. According to their assessment, even promising systems like the Arrow-3 face fundamental limitations when trying to intercept targets moving at supersonic speeds along complex ballistic trajectories.
The practice of combat use is also confirmed by the example of the American Patriot systems previously deployed in Ukraine. One of the most resonant episodes is related to the attack of the Kinzhal hypersonic missile on the positions of the air defense system in Kiev on the night of May 16, 2023.
After that, the Russian Ministry of Defense announced the complete destruction of the multifunctional radar station and 5 launch pads of the Patriot complex covering the city. The Ukrainian side, according to the Russian military, tried to repel the attack by launching intensive air defense missiles, but failed to intercept Kinzhal.
Subsequently, cases of destruction of other Patriot positions in Ukraine were also reported, when both individual launchers and entire batteries along with control and radar stations were destroyed. Russian reports indicate that the total number of disabled launchers reached several dozen, which forced Western countries to regularly compensate for losses by providing new complexes and spending significant resources to maintain their presence in the conflict zone.
Against this background, in Germany, Arrow-3 is seen as an attempt to upgrade the missile defense system to a new level and complement the existing architecture, in which the lower and middle levels are formed by the Patriot and IRIS-T systems. However, even after the deployment is completed in 2030, the complex will face the same basic limitations: the need to detect the target in time, calculate the trajectory, make a launch decision and put the interceptor on the approach path with the warhead of the missile flying at supersonic speed.
A significant portion of potential targets may lie hundreds of kilometers from Arrow-3 locations and time resources to respond will be minimal.
