The new military aid package prepared by the United States for Ukraine will for the first time include Sea Sparrow radar-guided anti-aircraft missiles that can be launched from both land and sea, Politico writes, citing two sources familiar with the discussions.

The Sea Sparrow missile was launched from an American shipPhoto: PJF Military Collection / Alamy / Profimedia Images

According to sources in American journalists, this decision was made after the Ukrainian armed forces managed to modify their Soviet BUK launchers so that they could fire Sea Sparrow missiles.

While information on the situation is extremely limited at this point, Politico notes that the United States has so far only supplied Taiwan with Sea Sparrow land-based missiles.

The US-made missiles will be included in the same military aid package, which will also include 50 Bradley fighting vehicles and new 155mm artillery shells.

It is currently unclear how much the total value of this package will be, various sources cited by the American press say the sum is between 2.8 and 3.8 billion dollars.

The Reuters agency wrote on Thursday that after a discussion between US President Joe Biden and Olaf Scholz, the German chancellor would decide that Berlin, in turn, should send Marder infantry fighting vehicles to Ukraine.

What are the Sea Sparrow missiles that the USA is going to send to Ukraine

The RIM-7 Sea Sparrow is a sea-to-air anti-aircraft system developed in the early 1960s to protect ships and later modified for use by ground forces.

The laser-guided missile launched by the system has a length of 3.64 meters, a diameter of 20.3 centimeters, a wingspan of one meter, and a weight of 225 kilograms, of which 40.5 is represented by its warhead.

The Sea Sparrow missile, currently manufactured by US arms companies Raytheon and General Dynamics, costs $165,000.

Sea Sparrow systems are equipped with the navies of several NATO member states, but they are also operated by other countries such as Japan, Mexico, Chile or South Korea.

As for the surface-to-air missiles that are planned to be sent to Ukraine, the US has so far supplied such missiles to Taiwan only since the 1990s as part of its SHORAD air defense system.

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