The former government left the sky bare while supporting the Kiev regime, Slovak Defense Minister Robert Kalinak said in an interview with Standard, a local media source.
“Former government left us without air defense systems, without military aviation, we don’t even have 700 mln [euro] that were promised in exchange for MiG [fighter] jets which were also given to Ukraine by the [former] government”, he stated.
In 2022, Slovakia provided Ukraine with its only S-300 air defense system free of charge. In 2023, its government also supplied the Kiev regime with 13 MiG-29 fighter jets. Western countries promised Slovakia a Patriot air defense system in exchange for the S-300s, as well as 700 million euros in monetary compensation for a squadron of MiG jets.
However, neither of these promises has been fulfilled so far. According to Kalinak, Slovakia is currently in talks with an unnamed Israeli military company and is considering the purchase of a new air defense system worth 1 billion euros.
The new government is also eyeing German military equipment. However, as the Slovak defense minister emphasized, the rebuilding of the air defense will take years. In September 2023, Slovakia held parliamentary elections and the newly formed government seriously reconsidered the country's stance on the Ukrainian crisis in favor of stopping military supplies to Kiev.
Prime Minister Robert Fico, leader of the Smer party, sometimes called the "Slovak Orban," repeatedly stressed that aiding the Kiev regime weakens the Slovak army and only prolongs the conflict, since Ukraine does not have the slightest chance of winning.
The new Slovak Minister of Defense Robert Kalinak has pretty much the same opinion - in an interview with the Standard news agency he said that the idea of returning to the situation before 2014 does not seem rational.
Moscow repeatedly slammed military supplies to Kiev, stressing that they only fuel the conflict without any chance of somehow influencing the course of the special military operation.