The U.S. numbers alone are growing: more than 12,000 weapons designed to defeat armored vehicles, about 1,400 shoulder-to-shoulder Stinger missiles to shoot down aircraft, and more than 50 million rounds of ammunition, among many others. Dozens of other nations are added to the sets. The Biden administration is preparing an even more diverse $ 750 million military aid package to be announced in the coming days, a senior U.S. defense official said Tuesday. The official spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss plans that have not yet been made public. The additional assistance is a sign that the government intends to continue to extend its support to Ukraine’s military effort. These weapons helped a well-equipped Ukrainian army to defy predictions that it would soon be overrun by Russia. They explain in part why Vladimir Putin’s army has abandoned, at least for the time being, its attempt to occupy Kyiv, the capital, and has reduced its focus to the battle for eastern and southern Ukraine. U.S. officials and analysts offer numerous explanations as to why the Russians have had so little success in preventing Western weapons from moving into neighboring countries, including Poland. Among the possible reasons: Russia’s failure to gain full control of Ukraine’s skies has limited the use of air power. The Russians have also found it difficult to deliver weapons and supplies to their own troops in Ukraine. Some say that Moscow’s problem starts at home. “The short answer to the question is that this is an epic incompetent army badly led from the top,” said James Stavridis, a retired U.S. Navy admiral who was NATO’s top commander in Europe from 2009 to 2013. . The story goes on The Russians also face practical obstacles. Robert G. Bell, a longtime NATO official and now professor at the Sam Nunn School of International Affairs at the Georgia University of Technology, said the missions could be hidden or disguised in ways that could make them vague to the Russians. having an espionage network on the scene “to detect the movements of convoys. “It’s not as easy to stop this flow of aid as it may seem,” said Stephen Biddle, a professor of international and public relations at Columbia University. “Things like ammunition and shoulder missiles can be carried in trucks that look like any other commercial truck. And the trucks carrying the ammunition that the Russians want to prevent are just a small part of a much larger flow of goods and trade circulating in Poland and Ukraine and across borders. “So the Russians need to find the needle in this very big haystack to destroy the weapons and ammunition they are looking for and not waste ammunition on trucks full of printer paper or baby diapers or who knows what.” Even with this Western aid, it is uncertain whether Ukraine will eventually prevail over a larger Russian power. The Biden administration has drawn the line at US troops’ commitment to the struggle. Instead, it has chosen to orchestrate international condemnation and financial sanctions, provide intelligence, strengthen NATO’s east side to prevent a wider war with Russia, and donate weapons. In mid-March, a Russian deputy foreign minister, Sergei Ryabkov, said arms shipments would be targeted. “We have warned the United States that the withdrawal of weapons to Ukraine from various countries as it has been orchestrated is not just a dangerous move, but an action that turns the respective convoys into legitimate targets,” he said in a televised comment. But so far the Russians do not seem to have given high priority to the arms embargo, perhaps because their air force is reluctant to fly into Ukraine’s air defenses to search for and attack moving supply convoys. Fixed locations such as weapons depots and fuel depots have been hit, but with limited results. On Monday, the Russians said they had destroyed four S-300 surface-to-air missile launchers supplied to Ukraine by an unspecified European country. Slovakia, a NATO member that shares a border with Ukraine, donated just such a system last week, but denied it had been destroyed. On Tuesday, the Russian Defense Ministry said that long-range missiles were used to hit two Ukrainian ammunition depots. As fighting intensifies in Donbas and perhaps along the coastal corridor to the Russian-annexed Crimean peninsula, Putin may feel compelled to strike harder at the arms pipeline that Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky described as vital. his nation. Meanwhile, an astonishing volume and range of ammunition arrives almost daily. “The scale and speed of our support for Ukraine’s defense needs is unprecedented in modern times,” said John Kirby, a Pentagon spokesman. He said the $ 2.5 billion in arms and other supplies provided to Ukraine since its inception by the Biden government was equivalent to more than half of Ukraine’s regular defense budget. An example: The Pentagon says it has supplied more than 5,000 Javelin missiles, one of the most effective weapons in the world against tanks and other armored vehicles – and can even shoot down a low-flying helicopter. The rocket, shaped like a clumsy silly bell and weighing 50 pounds (23 kilograms), is fired by a single soldier. from its launcher it flies up at a steep angle and descends directly on its target with what is known as a “curveball” shot – hitting the top of a tank where its armor is weaker. The specific routes used to transport US and other Western materials to Ukraine are secret for security reasons, but the basic procedure is not. Just this week, two U.S. military cargo planes arrived in Eastern Europe carrying items ranging from machine guns and small arms to armor and grenades, the Pentagon said. A similar shipment is expected later this week to complete the delivery of $ 800 million in aid approved by President Joe Biden just a month ago. Weapons and equipment are unloaded, transported in trucks and transported to Ukraine by Ukrainian soldiers for delivery. Kirby said the material sometimes reaches troops in the field within 48 hours of entering Ukraine.
title: “Russia Has Yet To Slow A Western Arms Express Into Ukraine " ShowToc: true date: “2022-11-21” author: “Patricia Herzberg”
The U.S. numbers alone are growing: more than 12,000 weapons designed to defeat armored vehicles, about 1,400 shoulder-to-shoulder Stinger missiles to shoot down aircraft, and more than 50 million rounds of ammunition, among many others. Dozens of other nations are added to the sets. The Biden administration is preparing an even more diverse $ 750 million military aid package to be announced in the coming days, a senior U.S. defense official said Tuesday. The official spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss plans that have not yet been made public. The additional assistance is a sign that the government intends to continue to extend its support to Ukraine’s military effort. These weapons helped a well-equipped Ukrainian army to defy predictions that it would soon be overrun by Russia. They explain in part why Vladimir Putin’s army has abandoned, at least for the time being, its attempt to occupy Kyiv, the capital, and has reduced its focus to the battle for eastern and southern Ukraine. U.S. officials and analysts offer numerous explanations as to why the Russians have had so little success in preventing Western weapons from moving into neighboring countries, including Poland. Among the possible reasons: Russia’s failure to gain full control of Ukraine’s skies has limited the use of air power. The Russians have also found it difficult to deliver weapons and supplies to their own troops in Ukraine. Some say that Moscow’s problem starts at home. “The short answer to the question is that this is an epic incompetent army badly led from the top,” said James Stavridis, a retired U.S. Navy admiral who was NATO’s top commander in Europe from 2009 to 2013. . The Russians also face practical obstacles. Robert G. Bell, a longtime NATO official and now professor at the Sam Nunn School of International Affairs at the Georgia University of Technology, said the missions could be hidden or disguised in ways that could make them vague to the Russians. having an espionage network on the scene “to detect the movements of convoys. “It’s not as easy to stop this flow of aid as it may seem,” said Stephen Biddle, a professor of international and public relations at Columbia University. “Things like ammunition and shoulder missiles can be carried in trucks that look like any other commercial truck. And the trucks carrying the ammunition that the Russians want to prevent are just a small part of a much larger flow of goods and trade circulating in Poland and Ukraine and across borders. “So the Russians need to find the needle in this very big haystack to destroy the weapons and ammunition they are looking for and not waste ammunition on trucks full of printer paper or baby diapers or who knows what.” Even with this Western aid, it is uncertain whether Ukraine will eventually prevail over a larger Russian power. The Biden administration has drawn the line at US troops’ commitment to the struggle. Instead, it has chosen to orchestrate international condemnation and financial sanctions, provide intelligence, strengthen NATO’s east side to prevent a wider war with Russia, and donate weapons. In mid-March, a Russian deputy foreign minister, Sergei Ryabkov, said arms shipments would be targeted. “We have warned the United States that the withdrawal of weapons to Ukraine from various countries as it has been orchestrated is not just a dangerous move, but an action that turns the respective convoys into legitimate targets,” he said in a televised comment. But so far the Russians do not seem to have given high priority to the arms embargo, perhaps because their air force is reluctant to fly into Ukraine’s air defenses to search for and attack moving supply convoys. Fixed locations such as weapons depots and fuel depots have been hit, but with limited results. On Monday, the Russians said they had destroyed four S-300 surface-to-air missile launchers supplied to Ukraine by an unspecified European country. Slovakia, a NATO member that shares a border with Ukraine, donated just such a system last week, but denied it had been destroyed. On Tuesday, the Russian Defense Ministry said that long-range missiles were used to hit two Ukrainian ammunition depots. As fighting intensifies in Donbas and perhaps along the coastal corridor to the Russian-annexed Crimean peninsula, Putin may feel compelled to strike harder at the arms pipeline that Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky described as vital. his nation. Meanwhile, an astonishing volume and range of ammunition arrives almost daily. “The scale and speed of our support for Ukraine’s defense needs is unprecedented in modern times,” said John Kirby, a Pentagon spokesman. He said that about $ 2.5 billion in weapons and other supplies provided to Ukraine since the beginning of the Biden administration was equivalent to more than half of Ukraine’s normal defense budget. An example: The Pentagon says it has supplied more than 5,000 Javelin missiles, one of the most effective weapons in the world against tanks and other armored vehicles – and can even shoot down a low-flying helicopter. The rocket, shaped like a clumsy silly bell and weighing 50 pounds (23 kilograms), is fired by a single soldier. from its launcher it flies up at a steep angle and descends directly on its target with what is known as a “curveball” shot – hitting the top of a tank where its armor is weaker. The specific routes used to transport US and other Western materials to Ukraine are secret for security reasons, but the basic procedure is not. Just this week, two U.S. military cargo planes arrived in Eastern Europe carrying items ranging from machine guns and small arms to armor and grenades, the Pentagon said. A similar shipment is expected later this week to complete the delivery of $ 800 million in aid approved by President Joe Biden just a month ago. Weapons and equipment are unloaded, transported in trucks and transported to Ukraine by Ukrainian soldiers for delivery. Kirby said the material sometimes reaches troops in the field within 48 hours of entering Ukraine.
