After President Biden announced last week that the United States will reposition a US Patriot missile system in Slovakia, the country’s defense minister Jaroslav Naď informed on Wednesday that Washington will also increase its military presence in the country.
As a part of NATO’s strengthening of the eastern flank, the US will send at least 600 American soldiers to Slovakia despite the previous information of only 40 soldiers and will be supplemented with high-end defense systems.
On top of the air-defense Patriot which Slovakia acquired as a replacement for the S-300 system the country donated to Ukraine, the defense systems include, as Naď confirmed, the Avenger air defense system, a Sentinel 3D radar, and eight-wheeled fighting vehicles Stryker that are lacking in the Slovak army.
The government of Prime Minister Eduard Heger announced previously in March that Slovakia will buy 76 Finnish-made Patria vehicles.
The German and Dutch forces in the country are already operating with three Patriot systems – highly sophisticated weapons that include radars, a command post, and missile launchers that need to be manned by dozens of soldiers- and the US government will move the Patriot acquired by Slovakia from Germany, where it has been previously stationed.
PM Heger’s cabinet already approved some 2,100 soldiers – the first international soldiers to be stationed in Slovakia – but since the new situation suggests increasing the number of NATO soldiers, new forces still need to be approved by the government.
Slovakian government was reluctant to have NATO troops deployed in the country before Russia’s invasion of Ukraine since most of the population opposed such a move,
According to the defense minister Naď, the negotiation of the American Patriot battery’s arrival was particularly challenging, adding that crucial in the process was his personal relations with US Secretary of Defence Lloyd Austin.
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