The U.S. approved the sale of 16 Mark VI patrol boats and naval equipment to Ukraine, the Ukrainian embassy in the U.S. stated on July 18.
Six boats are already being prepared using U.S. security assistance funds. The remaining vessels will be available for Ukraine to purchase using its military budget.
“The approval is a sign of deepening cooperation between the United States and Ukraine and a major step forward in advancing Ukraine’s naval capabilities,” the embassy stated.
The Mark VI are high-speed boats meant to operate mostly in shallow waters, and dedicated to coastal operation.
They can go up to 63 mph, accommodate up to 19 sailors, and will come with two automatic remotely controlled machine guns systems as well as six other machine guns on turret installations.
It is a welcomed help to bolster the scarce Ukrainian navy, which lacks the capability to patrol the country’s coastlines on the Black Sea and Azov Sea, let alone deter the Russian Navy’s Black Sea Fleet, which in 2018 attacked and seized three Ukrainian boats in the Kerch Strait.
Right now the Ukrainian Navy has only two patrol-type boats: the Island-class boats it also received from the U.S. in 2019. Three more Island-class boats are set to be transferred.
The arrival of 16 Mark VI boats will give a considerable boost to the Ukrainian Navy’s patrol capacity.
The first six of Mark VI boats is part of the $250 million military aid announced by the Pentagon on June 11, allocated to Ukraine after it was frozen last year. The other 10 boats Ukraine will be able to purchase using the funds from its defense budget, according to Ukraine’s Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba.
“This reaffirms the long-standing defense relationship between the United States and Ukraine – a critical partner on the front line of strategic competition with Russia,” the Pentagon stated.
Last year, U.S. President Donald Trump froze the $250 million to Ukraine while he sought help from the government to investigate former U.S. Vice President Joe Biden, his Democratic challenger in the November presidential election, leading to Trump’s impeachment.
However, the Trump Administration has approved and delivered significant amounts of military aid to Ukraine, including Javelin anti-tank missiles, which Ukrainian personnel could also fire from the decks of the Mk VIs, in recent years.
On June 17, the U.S. Embassy in Kyiv also announced another $60 million worth of weapons and equipment for the Ukrainian military.
