Bartosz Kownacki, MoD’s Secretary of State, along with undersecretary Tomasz Szatkowski, are currently visiting the United States of America. The visit is going to involve consulting talks pertaining both the modernization programmes related to the Polish Army, as well as widely understood international military cooperation.
As Minister Kownacki stated, Wisla (Vistula) medium range air defence programme is going to be one of the topics covered during the talks. Currently, the Ministry is in process of making decisions that will have an impact on the future of the Polish medium range air defence programme.
Last year, the former leadership of the Polish Ministry of Defence had selected the Patriot air defence system to become the product which is going to be procured within the scope of the Wisła programme. This system is being offered within the framework of the USA offer by the US-based Raytheon company. Antoni Macierewicz, Polish Minister of Defence, noted, during the November meeting of the Parliamentary National Defence Commission, referring to the Wisła programme, that “This contract is virtually non-existent”, criticizing the conditions of the offer.
The talks between the leadership of the Polish Ministry of Defence and the US officials will also be related to the widely understood military collaboration, including the area of preparations of the NATO summit in Poland. Minister Tomasz Szatkowski stated that not only are the talks going to involve the US authorities, but they are also going to be carried out with involvement on the part of the representatives of several think-tanks and analytical centres. Szatkowski announced that his visit in the United States of America is going to last one week.