We have nothing in our arsenal that can do what the Stinger missiles do?
Read...... the stingers are for export customers
The Stinger missile IS in our arsenal. We gave a bunch of them out of our inventory to Ukraine, and Raytheon is saying they can't manufacture replacements for a few years.
The lone export customer that they're building Stingers for now also provided Raytheon with key components that Raytheon can't source.
The last time the United States purchased Stinger missiles was in 2004...
Yes; the whole arsenal. It sounds like a joke, but it isn’t. The US model is to create air dominance, that is, no enemy aircraft in the sky to bother the tanks and infantry. That means blasting their airfields, radar and SAMs, and promptly shooting down any of their aircraft that still dare to take off, using everything from AWACS, Patriot missiles, much better fighters, etc. all in an integrated air defense system.
Stingers were created for a scenario which in US planning should no longer exist, where the US has not gained air dominance and ground units needed their own air defense assets. That was a plausible scenario way back in the 1980’s when the Soviets had thousands of active aircraft available for battles in Germany.
But that situation simply went away. The US (and NATO) was left unchallenged in the air. Stingers didnt get much use in Iraq in 1991 or 2003. And if the Russians pick a fight with NATO now the betting is still that the US will remain unchallenged, and the Stingers will remain redundant.