Ukraine aims, with the help of the international community, to achieve an impossible “parity” of heavy weapons with the invading army, while fearing that the West will lose interest in the war
The danger of war manifests itself in a thousand different ways, but for Ukraine, the two biggest fears are slowing the arrival of weapons and the West losing interest in the war against Russia. Given the approaching NATO summit in Madrid and Wednesday’s meeting of defense ministers in Brussels, the president, Volodímir Zelenski, has once again reiterated the need to rearm his country, while his trusted adviser, Mykhailo Podoliak, has added figures to the required : The Ukrainian army needs some 5,000 pieces of heavy weapons if it is to have options to push back Russia. The list includes 2,000 armored vehicles, 1,000 155-millimeter howitzers, another 1,000 drones, 500 tanks and 300 rocket launchers.
Only in this way, Podoliak says, can Kiev hope local forces reach a certain “parity” with Moscow’s war machine and resist firepower strong enough to stop the advance on Donbas. The presidency is trying to get its message across at the upcoming meeting of defense ministers to be held this Wednesday in the European capital by the North Atlantic Council, the body headed by Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg that makes political decisions in NATO. Zelensky also wants to take advantage of a visit from Italian Prime Minister Mario Draghi, French President Emmanuel Macron and German Chancellor Olaf Scholz to show solidarity with Ukraine ahead of the G-7 meeting in Bavaria in the coming months. days 26, 27 and 28 of this month.
“We are waiting for a decision,” Podolyak said in a tone of confidence not shared by his entire cabinet. While some twenty countries are holding on to the commitment to supply first-class weapons to the former Soviet Republic and the deliveries have already taken place, the pursuit of some fairness with the invaders is unlikely, if not impossible. The fighting in the south and east of the country has exposed the Russian artillery superiority, which US intelligence already had, knowing that it is the Kremlin’s real military battering ram, but not so much other allied countries, who now face their own difficulties in the supply cycle to Kiev.
There are material obstacles to the debate that divides international partners, especially in Europe, about the desirability of sending long-range teams, which could accelerate the spiral of confrontation with Russia. Comparison with Russian arsenals is presented as a battle of giants, given the huge investments the West would have to make – already ravaged by its own financial crises – and the time it takes to manufacture the weapons and train the Ukrainians in their use. of it. At present, only the United States is demonstrating sufficient economic and industrial power to continue feeding Ukrainian troops. In the longer term, the UK will come in, while other governments will scrape together what they can. Norway announced a week ago the delivery of 22 vehicles equipped with self-propelled howitzer platforms and Belgium will send 20,000 artillery shells previously bought from the US for a value of 76 million euros.
Italy, for its part, is also determined to support Kiev, although the population is beginning to fragment. A poll conducted earlier this month by ‘Corriere della Sera’ showed that 44% of Italians are neutral on the war (six points more than in March), 60% think that NATO is not doing well and that more than half the shipment of more weapons to Ukraine. Experts attribute it to dissatisfaction with the rise in energy bills that politicians attribute to the war. Is it a purely Italian matter? The Ukrainian Defense Minister thinks not. In a recent interview with ‘The Economist’, Oleksiy Reznikov admits that the prolongation of the war is taking its toll on politicians, the media and society, as evidenced by the fact that in Europe the debate between leaders who find it necessary to With Russia and those committed to strengthening the diplomatic path, Reznikov says this apparent fatigue is reflected in a slower delivery of weapons. “Either the world doesn’t quite understand what is happening, or it understands it perfectly, but it is tired and ready to accept the view that Ukrainians die every day. We need help quickly,” said the minister in the interview.
All of these factors complicate the Zelensky government’s new inventory management policy. If everything was valid at the beginning of the war and during the siege of Kiev – the pistols and machine guns were counted by the tens of thousands – the army now demands very specific weapons in a kind of combat where the popular spears and portable anti-tank systems are ineffective. . They were very useful in the first weeks of the invasion in stopping the advance of the ground forces, but their range – from 20 to 600 meters in the case of the anti-tank NLAW, and from 1000 to 2500 meters in the spears – now shoots up. shortage in the confrontation with the Russian artillery.
Zelensky believes that heavy weapons are overdue, Ukrainian military circles have always believed that in the first phase of the war, the West preferred to equip soldiers with light weapons because of the characteristics of combat – urban and guerrilla – but also because of the convinced that the Ukraine would fall in a few days. Under these parameters, the United States and the United Kingdom also supplied numerous Stinger anti-aircraft missiles, very effective against enemy aircraft at low altitudes, but impractical with long-range batteries. Now the Ukrainian army is learning to use dozens of new weapons. NATO-style 155mm batteries, British multiple rocket launchers, M777 guns firing five shells per minute at up to 30km, and kamikaze drones. It’s the arsenal that the Kiev government dreams of, although many of its operators have to resort to Google’s translator for the time being to process them.
Source: La Verdad
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