NATO Will Let Ukraine Buy Weapons Through Its Procurement Agency, FT Reports

NATO will allow Ukraine to buy weapons, ammunition and military equipment through the NATO Support and Procurement Agency (NSPA), the Financial Times reported Thursday, Oct. 22. The aim is faster deliveries at lower prices.

The NSPA manages contracts, runs joint procurement and organizes logistics for alliance members. Ukraine now gets a seat at that table.

"It provides Ukraine with the ability to have a more structured framework to leverage a broad range of capabilities that we offer: procurement expertise, support services and access to established industrial base," Jacqueline Borsboom, the agency's director of support to operations, told the FT. She added: "There will be economies of scale."

What changes for Kyiv

Ukraine has leaned heavily on bilateral deals, country by country. The NSPA route adds a pooled channel on top of that. Buying through a shared agency can mean bigger orders and better terms.

The groundwork is already in motion. Last week the NSPA held an industry event in Kyiv attended by about 150 Ukrainian companies. It walked manufacturers through how to register as suppliers and bid on contracts.

On Oct. 7, a NATO Military Committee delegation visited Ukraine for the first time in eight years. It included military representatives from all 32 member states.

Washington is part of the backdrop

The FT noted that the arrangement came together even as U.S.-Ukraine relations sit at their lowest point since the February 2025 Oval Office confrontation between President Donald Trump and President Volodymyr Zelenskyy.

This month Trump announced a diesel export deal with Russia, which he framed as a way to lower U.S. fuel prices. Ukraine has since complained of disruptions to some intelligence sharing and to its use of the Starshield satellite system. Zelenskyy said a meeting in Oslo on Tuesday, Oct. 20, produced an agreement to resolve those issues. No fix has been publicly detailed.

There is also the Patriot question. The Washington Post reported, citing its own sources, that the Trump administration has not approved a transfer of Patriot interceptor missiles to Ukraine. According to those sources, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth never formally rejected the request but took no steps to approve it. The Pentagon's position on the record is not part of that reporting.

On NATO membership, Secretary of State Marco Rubio said on Oct. 6 that it is not currently under consideration because Washington is focused on ending the war. Trump said in February 2025 that Ukraine should "forget" about joining the alliance. He argued that Kyiv's NATO ambitions had prompted Russia's full-scale invasion.

The administration's stated priority is a negotiated end to the fighting, and it has tied the diesel deal to domestic fuel costs. Kyiv sees the supply disruptions differently, which is why it is building routes that do not run through Washington.

The money and the guarantees

The procurement agency solves a buying problem, not a funding problem. The European Union is seeking an additional €70 billion for Ukraine for 2027, according to RBC Ukraine. The previously agreed loan no longer covers the country's needs because Russia has intensified its attacks.

That is a large sum for European taxpayers, and the NSPA channel does not say who foots the bill for any given order.

Security guarantees are on the table too. Zelenskyy said the United States has offered guarantees modeled on Article 5 of the North Atlantic Treaty. He said Trump's special envoy Steve Witkoff would convey the proposals to Russian leadership during a visit to St. Petersburg on Oct. 21. The details of the guarantees have not been made public. Neither Moscow nor Washington has officially commented on Zelenskyy's statement.

Separately, NATO has decided to boost its Black Sea presence with additional patrol aircraft, radar systems and drones.

What to watch

The first test is practical: whether Ukrainian firms actually win NSPA contracts, and whether delivery times and prices improve as Borsboom says they will. The second is political. Neither Washington nor Moscow has said what came of Witkoff's St. Petersburg trip, and the content of any Article 5-style guarantee remains undisclosed.