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Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has appealed to the country's allies for more air defence interceptors. This is after another night of Russian missile attacks which killed four people. Lena Surzhko Harned is a professor of political science in the United States and she says the surface-to-air interceptor missiles are crucial to Kyiv's success in the war against Moscow.

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00:01We have seen in the latest attack on Kyiv, for instance, and just all over Ukraine, really,
00:07Russia is deliberately using more of the, not so much drones, but really their ammunition, the heavy ammunition.
00:19And without them, without this defense system, it's going to be very difficult for Ukraine to combat them.
00:26Well, Ukrainians have been working on that problem for quite some time because they are very well aware that Ukraine
00:33has now capability of producing some of these artillery themselves, but, you know, not defensive stuff.
00:42So they've been relying on these missiles from their allies and from the United States.
00:46So they've been working with Europeans. And of course, Zelensky has repeatedly asked President Trump for the Patriot missiles.
00:56So it's ongoing work. It's a difficult task and an ongoing work.
01:01Of course, it would have the promise from President Trump and Ankara to give Ukraine the license to produce Patriots
01:12themselves.
01:12President Trump has walked back from that recently.
01:16And even if that was possible, it would take, according to experts, you know, up to several years before Ukraine
01:24can produce those missiles themselves.
01:26So it's a significant problem. And, you know, as far as I know, Ukrainian leadership is aware of it.
01:32Ukrainian citizens are aware of this and they are trying to be more vigilant.
01:37At least, you know, the citizens are trying to be more vigilant of not taking those alarms when the air
01:45defense are coming through lightly and take them seriously.
01:49So Zelensky's approval ratings are still relatively high.
01:53I mean, they're not as high as they used to be.
01:56So in the beginning of war, right, they were around 90 percent and then they dwindled down.
02:01And of course, after that infamous meeting in the Oval Office last year, they went up again significantly.
02:07But now he still holds over 50 percent approval ratings.
02:10So that's quite significant, actually.
02:14In terms of, however, how Ukrainians are feeling about war, I keep repeating this to anyone who asks, there is
02:21no people in the world more happy to accept the end of the war, right, who are ready for this
02:28war to end.
02:29The question is how it ends.
02:31And as of right now, actually, the latest statistics that came out of Ukraine, they show about over 50 percent
02:40being ready to freeze the conflict where it is.
02:45But again, this is this is not going to be the end of the war, right?
02:48We all know this.
02:51But folks are tired.
02:52Absolutely.
02:53This has been grueling five years, winter, summer, spring, fall, you name it.
02:58There is not a single night that can be peaceful.
03:01There is not a single day that can be peaceful, even though there's, you know, according to the Institute for
03:07the Study of War, International Study of War, they claim that they, you know, the front is basically not moving
03:14in any direction.
03:15It might be true.
03:16It's true.
03:17Right.
03:17However, this doesn't mean that there's not heavy fighting and loss of life every day.
03:23So it takes its toll.
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