Russian missiles in Ukraine have failure rate up to 60%, U.S. officials say

The disclosure could help explain why Russia has failed to achieve what most could consider basic objectives since its invasion a month ago.

The United States assesses that Russia is suffering failure rates as high as 60 per cent for some of the precision-guided missiles it is using to attack Ukraine, three U.S. officials with knowledge of the intelligence told Reuters.

The disclosure could help explain why Russia has failed to achieve what most could consider basic objectives since its invasion a month ago, such as neutralizing Ukraine’s air force, despite the apparent strength of its military against Ukraine’s much smaller armed forces.

The U.S. officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity due to the sensitivity of the information, did not provide evidence to support the assessment and did not disclose what precisely was driving high Russian missile failure rates.

Reuters was unable to independently verify the figures.

The Kremlin and Russia’s defense ministry did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Such a high failure rate can include anything from launch failures to a missile failing to explode on impact.

U.S. defense officials told reporters this week that the Pentagon assesses that Russia has launched more than 1,100 missiles of all kinds since the war began. The U.S. officials have so far not said how many of those hit their targets and how many failed to do so.

Citing U.S. intelligence, three U.S. officials said the United States estimated that Russia’s failure rate varied day-to-day, depended on the type of missile being launched, and could sometimes exceed 50 per cent. Two of them said it reached as high as 60 per cent.