President Volodymyr Zelenskyy recently told journalists that Ukraine cannot obtain "an air-to-air missile with the range we need," and that talks with France have so far produced only the MICA, which reaches roughly 80 km.
Zelenskyy did not name the missile he meant. Objectively, however, the pool of long-range candidates among Western partners is small: the latest variants of the American AIM-120 AMRAAM (the C-8 and the D-3) and Europe's longest-range MBDA Meteor.
Read more: Germany Pays More for AIM-120 Than Its Own Meteor But There’s No Other Option
Reported range figures vary. Most public reporting (Raytheon does not publish full performance data) places the newest AIM-120D-3 in the ~160 km class, with some sources citing up to ~180 km. The AIM-120C-8 is also quoted at around 160 km (the C-7 was roughly 120 km). Meteor is officially rated by MBDA at 200+ km.
But published maximum ranges are idealized. Real engagement range depends strongly on flight profiles — launch altitude, closure rates, headings and whether the target maneuvers. A missile fired from 10 km altitude at a non-maneuvering, head-on target will travel significantly farther than the same missile launched from low altitude at a high-G target attempting to escape. Any quoted maximum therefore assumes optimal conditions.
There is also the No-Escape Zone (NEZ) — the distance inside which a target has effectively no chance of outrunning the missile. NEZ is typically much smaller than a missile’s absolute maximum range, and it is the NEZ that often determines tactical effectiveness.
In practice, no Western missile matches Meteor's NEZ performance for NATO fighters. The key question then becomes which fighters can field Meteor, and under what conditions to unlock its full potential. Operational Meteor integration today is limited to late-block Eurofighter variants, Rafale F3R, and Gripen (C/D and E/F).
You cannot simply bolt Meteor onto second-hand Ukrainian F-16AMs or onto older Mirage-2000-5s (which can carry MICA) — it's not plug-and-play. Even integrating Meteor onto Eurofighters has been complex: Germany, for example, only first test-fired Meteor in 2024.
So Ukraine currently lacks in-service Meteor carriers. That should change in 2026, when used Gripen C/D fighters are scheduled for delivery, and it would be highly desirable for those jets to be equipped with Meteors.
Equally important is delivery of the long-promised Saab 340 AEW&C aircraft (announced for transfer in spring 2024). AEW platforms provide automated target designation for fighters: to fire a long-range missile you must first detect and reliably track the target, and a fighter’s own radar may be insufficient, and is itself a significant emission signature.
That is why supplying AIM-120C-8s to Ukrainian F-16AMs (as Romania has done) is not a complete solution without AEW support. The effective package for long-range intercepts is a fighter with a long-range missile plus an AEW aircraft providing automated cueing.
The importance of this pairing was illustrated by the large aerial engagement on the night of 7 May 2025 between Pakistan and India. Pakistan deployed J-10C fighters with long-range PL-15 missiles and 12 AEW aircraft (Swedish Saab 2000 Erieye and Chinese ZDK-03). India, despite fielding Rafale with Meteor, had only six AEW platforms (EMB-145 AEW Netra and A-50EI), and questions remain about the level of automated cueing available to them.
Read more: India Doubles Down on Meteor Missiles to Keep Its Rafales Ahead In Next Air War
