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including possibly u.s. patriot missiles, what would it mean for ukraine? so really, ukraine is in a position now where it is reliant on western support to continue this fight, taking the individual weapons, the patriot missiles would be crucial in ukraine s efforts to thwart russia s air assault that continues to bombard energy and civilian infrastructure in the country. and ukraine s added systems have been fairly effective in stopping a large majority of the missiles andro attacks that hav been coming in. it would provide another layer on top of that. another type of weapon the u.s. is said to be thinking of providing, precision bomb kits, a way to convert what are called dumb bomb, regular bombs into guided ones. and that would help attack russian positions which of course we know are entrenched in both the southern and the eastern front lines. clare sebastian reporting
it s something for months the biden administration was not willing to consider, given concerns about escalation or just the pure scale of time it takes to train up on those systems. that will now change. it s been a process over the course of the last several weeks. president biden will make that announcement that $1.8 billion includes patriot missile systems. it s become critical over the course of the last several weeks, something president zelenskyy said personally to president biden by phone a couple of weeks ago, given the russian ramping up of those attacks on civilian infrastructure. president biden now willing to go that route. also will include precision bomb kits to include as well. $1.8 billion. the number is big. the scale overall of u.s. assistance has been enormous. but the scale of what this specific weapons system actually brings to the table, it simply has no precedent up to this point, john. phil mattingly, chief white house correspondent, fast-moving developments.
The US is expected to announce that it will give Ukraine Patriot missile defence systems and precision bomb kits that will transform ordinary bombs into smart ones that use GPS coordinates to find their targets.
that includes a long sought after patriot defense systems and precision bomb kits. cnn s jessica dean is with us now. zelenskyy is going to address a joint meeting of congress tonight just ahead of a political shift in congress. what are we expecting to hear from president zelenskyy? reporter: well, victor this evening, we re expecting to hear more after what we heard from him in the oval office. thanking them, the president, congress for helping ukraine in what has been the last year. we re coming up on the one-year anniversary of this war in ukraine, and we re also expecting to see him try to bolster support for ukraine s efforts. you just laid it out. there is a changing tide here on the hill. of course, the house is about to be taken over by republicans in the next congress, and there have been some republicans, especially house republicans that have indicated they are not willing to just blindly sign checks to send over in ukraine funding, and that is a bit of a departure as to