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While Western discussions have focused on sending sophisticated weapons to Kiev, Hal Brands, a Henry Kissinger Distinguished Professor at Johns Hopkins University School of Advanced International Studies, argues that what Ukraine needs the most, besides air-defense systems, is artillery ammunition. He describes the current conflict as an artillery-centric one: “if Kiev can’t find enough artillery pieces and ammunition, especially 155mm shells, it will be at a dire firepower deficit along the conflict’s front lines.”

Already on March 29, Earle Mack, former US ambassador to Finland, writing in a piece for The Hill, described the current confrontation as proxy attrition warfare, that is one which seeks military victory by wearing down the enemy. He worried that Ukraine seemed bound to tire out first. Things have not gotten much better for Kiev, so far.

A July 23 New York Times story, by former Marine infantryman Thomas Gibbons-Neff, based on “dozens of visits to the front line” quotes a Ukrainian commander: “we’re trading our people for their people and they have more people and equipment.” According to the story, “Ukraine has made marginal progress in its ability to coordinate directly between its troops closest to Russian forces on the so-called zero line and those assaulting forward.” Moreover, the country’s artillery is in short supply, and “a mixture of munitions sent from different countries” is employed. The thing is that accuracy varies greatly between them and the Ukrainians need to use more ammunition. In addition, according to the same news report, “some of the older shells and rockets sent from abroad are damaging their equipment and injuring soldiers.”

Rather than using the complex military communication equipment, Ukraine’s troops employ “less sophisticated, but easier-to-use programs like smartphone messaging apps, private internet chat rooms.” Most of this system is dependent on Starlink satellite internet, and therefore it takes longer to communicate important military information when the units are assaulting and a Wi-Fi router is absent. In this case, unbelievably, “attacking troops have to reach someone with an internet connection to call for support.

”Regarding ammo, the problem is that US authorities themselves estimate that Moscow is capable of producing “1 million rounds of 152mm artillery ammunition per year.” The US, in contrast, produces merely a seventh of that, according to Hal Brands.Right now, the US itself needs to purchase conventional artillery ammunition from its South Korean ally. In what Brands describes as a “desperate global scavenger hunt for munitions”, Washington has also been seeking ammo from Japan, as well as “repositioning  rounds stored in Israel to Ukraine.

”Europe’s stockpiles are in no better shape. According to the International Institute of Strategic Studies, NATO European states armed forces are “hollowed out, plagued by unserviceable equipment and severely depleted ammunition stocks.” Bloomberg’s journalist and military historian Max Hastings writes that, over a year ago, Berlin had committed itself to €100 billion to rebuild its worn out forces. So far, however, only an estimated 1% of that has been spent. The German National Security Strategy, last month, stressed the weakness of Germany’s economy. According to Hastings, the “political will” to strengthen their armed forces is “absent” not only in Germany, but also in other European countries.

As I wrote before, the problem for Europe goes way beyond depleted weapons stockpiles: for it to rearm itself, re-industrialization is badly needed, something which, quite ironically, Washington itself has consistently opposed via its subsidy war against the European bloc. In addition, Europe, with its heavily diffused and fragmented defense, lacks a European Union common defense market and a legal and bureaucratic framework, as Sophia Besch (a Carnegie Endowment for International Peace fellow), and Max Bergmann (former member of the US Policy Planning Staff and Director of the Eurasia Program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies) write.

Britain’s industry today faces many difficulties, and the same thing happens with other European nations – manufacturers badly need funding expansion and governments are increasingly growing “tired” of the conflict’s costs.As for the US, lecturer in History at Yale Michael Brenes argues that America’s own “war machine” is “broken”, with privatizations and several problems. He paints a picture of “shortages in production”, and “interruptions in supply chains”, all of which have compromised Washington’s ability to “deliver weapons to Ukraine.

”To sum it up, the current state of affairs, with a Western deindustrializations crisis, makes it very difficult for the political West to pursue its proxy attrition war. It simply cannot produce all the weapons it is pledging Ukraine. For the West, in fact, it is already a challenge to provide Kiev with enough ammunition.

Uriel Araujo is a researcher with a focus on international and ethnic conflicts. Featured image is from InfoBrics The original source of this article is InfoBrics Copyright © Uriel Araujo, InfoBrics, 2023

Musk highlights the grim situation Ukraine is in.

Ahmed Adel, Cairo-based geopolitics and political economy researcher

Western media has admitted that significant amounts of weapons sent to Kiev to battle Russian forces were destroyed or damaged in the first two weeks of the offensive, which would explain why the US took the evidently desperate actionto transfer cluster bombs to the Kiev regime. Responding to this provocation, Russian President Vladimir Putin warned that cluster munition use would be reciprocated. 

The Ukrainian offensive on the lines of operations south of Donetsk, Zaporozhye and Artemovsk (Bakhmut) began on June 4. Russian President Vladimir Putin said on June 27 that Ukraine had lost 259 tanks and 780 armoured vehicles since the start of the so-called counteroffensive, i.e., the first few weeks of the offensive. This aligns with what the New York Times recently admitted, the destruction of 20% of Ukrainian armoured vehicles in the first two weeks of the Ukrainian counteroffensive.

On July 11, Russian Defence Minister Sergei Shoigu reported that since the start of its counteroffensive, Kiev had suffered more than 26,000 casualties and lost more than 3,000 pieces of various weapons.

Due to such devastation, Ukrainian General Valery Zaluzhnyexpressed dismay at the fact that his forces do not have Western F-16 warplanes, on which the US recently agreed to allow Ukrainian pilots to train. Without these warplanes, especially as the supply is expected to take at least several months, Ukrainian soldiers are vulnerable to Russian helicopters and artillery.

Camille Grand, former assistant secretary-general of NATO, said that the absence of air defences that Western jets could provide for an attack on Ukraine means “that casualty rates are likely to be higher than in other conventional conflicts.”

“American officials,” according to the New York Times, “said that the Ukrainians had begun moving again, but more deliberately, more adept at navigating minefields and mindful of the casualty risks. With the influx of cluster munitions from the United States, they said, the pace might pick up.”

However, this is seemingly not going to be the case as Ukraine will soon run out of cluster munitions and will not receive any more in the aftermath of the US receiving global condemnation for its hypocritical decision after warning Russia not to use such weapons. 

National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan told NBC News’ “Meet the Press” on July 16, “Our current plan is not to replenish that stockpile. It is rather to build up the capacity to produce the unitary round of the 155, the non-cluster munition round of ammunition.”

For his part, Lieutenant General Douglas Sims II, director of operations for the Pentagon’s Joint Staff, said at a press conference that Ukraine had received cluster munitions from the US, as well as from other countries, six days after Washington revealed the weapons would be included in a new round of military assistance.

This provocative action prompted Russian President Vladimir Putin to warn Kiev on July 16 that he would consider using them against Ukraine “if they are used against us.”

“Russia has a sufficient supply of various types of cluster munitions,” the Russian leader said during an interview. “If they are used against us, we reserve the right to mirror actions.”

In his interview, Putin highlighted that the Biden administration had previously called the use of cluster munitions a war crime and that he agreed with that assessment.

For all the brave talk by Sullivan about replenishing stockpiles, Putin pointed out in his address that the Ukrainian Army uses about six thousand 155 mm calibre projectiles daily in its operations, while the US produces 15,000 per month.

“They don’t have enough, and Europe doesn’t have enough anymore. But they haven’t found anything better than proposing cluster munitions,” the Russian leader said.

In fact, even Twitter owner Elon Musk highlighted the contradiction of Sullivan and the impossibility of the situation for Ukraine.

“I want the best outcome for the people. Russia has at least 4 times the artillery of Ukraine and 10 times the ammunition. We have run out of normal ammunition to send Ukraine, so now send them cluster bombs in desperation, debasing ourselves with no change to the outcome,” Musk tweeted.” 

Considering that Washington warned Russia against using cluster munitions but is now sending them to the Kiev regime, it highlights the Ukrainian military’s desperate position. This situation will not be reversed as Ukraine does not have the manpower or capabilities to win the war, which is now being fought on Russia’s terms and pace.

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It wasn’t precisely clear why Putin “suddenly” had to emphasize the importance of Russia’s hypersonic weapons and other key strategic systems. Namely, in early July, the US Army reported that it has demonstrated the operational capability of its newest ground-based missile launcher with the system’s recent successful firing of a “Tomahawk” land-attack cruise missile. 

Drago Bosnic, independent geopolitical and military analyst

It’s certainly not breaking news that Russia is the world’s leader in advanced military technologies, particularly new types of missiles and other similar weapons. As Moscow has a comfortable lead over Washington DC in both the development and deployment of hypersonic weapons, it has decided to capitalize on this massive advantage and is now using a greater portion of its second-to-none arsenal to deter the belligerent thalassocracy. Back in late June, Russian President Vladimir Putin stated that approximately half of all Russian strategic missile divisions have been rearmed with hypersonic warheads.

“About half of the units of Russia’s Strategic Missile Force [RVSN] have been equipped with the latest ‘Yars’ missile systems and are being rearmed with modern ‘Avangard’ warheads,” Putin was quoted by TASS, further adding: “In light of the new challenges and invaluable experience of the special military operation [SMO] we will continue to improve the Armed Forces in every possible way.”

Putin also stressed the importance of Russia’s efforts to further develop its nuclear triad as the key guarantee of the Eurasian giant’s strategic security, as well as geopolitical stability on a global level. In addition, he also announced that new units of the liquid fuel, super-heavy “Sarmat” ICBM (intercontinental ballistic missile) would “soon enter duty”. It would seem that this process is in its late phases and that Moscow will indeed deploy additional launchers of these unparalleled weapons. Russian president added that similar modernization efforts are being implemented in the other two legs of its nuclear triad.

At the time when the aforementioned statements were given, it wasn’t precisely clear why Putin “suddenly” had to emphasize the importance of Russia’s hypersonic weapons and other key strategic systems. Namely, in early July, the US Army reported that it has demonstrated the operational capability of its newest ground-based missile launcher with the system’s recent successful firing of a “Tomahawk” land-attack cruise missile. This came after a test launch of a multi-purpose SM-6 missile earlier this year from what is officially known as the “Typhon” Weapon System.

The US Army now has one unit registered under the official name Mid-Range Capability battery equipped with the “Typhon”, which has four trailer-based launchers and other supporting vehicles and equipment. The service’s Rapid Capabilities and Critical Technologies Office (RCCTO) announced the “Tomahawk” launch on June 28, but the actual test had occurred on the 27th. This came just over half a year ago after the US Army took delivery of its first “Typhon” launchers and other components of its first Mid-Range Capability (MRC) battery from Lockheed Martin, one of the giants of America’s Military Industrial Complex (MIC).

US Army’s top-ranking officials recently stated that their goal is to reach at least the initial level of true operational capability with the first MRC battery before the end of Fiscal Year 2023 (which will be in September this year). As previously mentioned, a complete “Typhon” battery consists of four launchers and a command post, all on trailers, as well as other support vehicles. The service plans to employ the “Typhon” primarily against ground targets using either “Tomahawk” or SM-6. And while the former has a land-based origin (Cold War-era BGM-109G “Gryphon”), the latter is a naval missile.

In fact, the SM-6 was originally designed as a surface-to-air missile (SAM), with a secondary anti-ship capability. However, the US Navy modified it and now operates several versions designed for multipurpose missions. Considering how far behind Russia the US is in terms of hypersonic weapons, the SM-6 is its best bet for engaging incoming highly-maneuverable hypersonic weapons. And even this is highly questionable, despite US attempts to present its ludicrous claims about the “Patriot” shooting down Russian hypersonic missiles as true. If that claim was true, the US would never need the SM-6 to counter Russian missiles.

The 9-A-7660 “Kinzhal’s” speed ranges from over 12,000 km per hour to almost 16,000 km per hour. If we were to imagine an interceptor missile flying at 4000 km per hour hitting another missile flying three or four times faster than that, can anyone really believe there would be anything more than a bunch of sparks, let alone a wreckage of any kind? Worse yet, the alleged “Russian ‘Kinzhal’ hypersonic missile” fell to the ground in a relatively good condition and was then even photographed and presented as supposed “evidence”. So, again, if nothing more than basic physics is taken into account, the claims become extremely difficult to even consider, let alone take at face value.

However, as the US has no operational hypersonic weapons of its own, with the most recent cancelation of its AGM-183A missile project, this capability for the Pentagon has been pushed further back. This is making it desperate to present Russia’s missiles as much worse than they truly are. And yet, In stark contrast to the US, Russia fields the Mach 12-capable “Kinzhal” air-launched hypersonic missile carried by modified MiG-31K/I interceptors and Tu-22M3 long-range bombers, the Mach 28-capable “Avangard” HGV deployed on various ICBMs and the Mach 9-capable scramjet-powered “Zircon” hypersonic cruise missile deployed on naval (both submarines and surface ships) and (soon) on land platforms.

Russia is decades ahead of the US, both in terms of deployment and hypersonic weapon capabilities. In addition, Moscow has been using these systems against the Kiev regime and NATO high-value targets in Ukraine. The Russian military is not just the world’s only armed force widely deploying hypersonic missiles, but it’s also the only one that has inducted them in all domains (air, land, sea), including on strategic weapons.

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