There is currently an election campaign in the United States with discussions about how to help Ukraine.
There is debate about whether to tie aid to Ukraine to Israel or to present a plan where Europe would finance Ukraine.
This, by the way, was Washington’s long-standing goal - for European NATO partners to increase defense spending by at least 2% of GDP, and for the EU’s problems to be paid for by the EU. Americans can safely open champagne.
In general, even in the situation of a showdown between isolationists, Trumpists and Democrats, the United States has ALREADY skimmed off most of the cream. They have already ousted the Russian Federation from the gas market in the EU, avoided the drift of the EU towards the Russian Federation and China, and gained a huge arms market.
Poland, Romania and the Baltic countries alone are ordering hundreds of missile launchers and thousands of missiles, and the US will also increase annual production of Patriot batteries to 12 due to demand. Now, as Europe begins to increase military spending and aid packages for Ukraine, the US is closing its doors in domestic politics and to the Middle East.
Germany doubles military aid to Kyiv - from 4 to 8 billion dollars. And if Berlin reaches the planned 2% of GDP on defense, then in 10 years it will spend close to a trillion euros.
We will probably see the restoration of the Bundeswehr in the format of the 80s of the last century, not only aid packages for Ukraine.
British Defense Secretary Grant Shapps announced that the country will increase military support for Ukraine.
Denmark is also significantly increasing its support - by $3 billion over the next 5 years.
The Netherlands is also increasing its efforts - 2 billion euros in military assistance.
Finland continues to supply us with packages worth 100–200 million euros every month. They are extremely secret, and only then do mortars, cannon artillery and armored personnel carriers emerge at the front.
The amounts appearing everywhere are very serious. The EU alone provided approximately €84 billion in military and economic aid, cheap loans and tranches.
Production of 155-mm artillery shells at the Rheinmetall plant, Germany, June 06, 2023.
Of these, 14 billion are free as grants. This is the three-year pre-war budget of the Armed Forces of Ukraine!
There was also assistance within NATO, and not just the EU plus Canada ($750 million) and Australia. The United States itself, by the way, provided Kyiv with 60 billion dollars, of which 44 billion were in weapons, equipment, training, and logistics. Colossal amounts.
Even without humanitarian aid and support programs for refugees, Kyiv probably received between $140 and $160 billion. The British Commonwealth received 31 billion old dollars during World War II. At parity, this amount is now around 400 billion.
That is, we have already received more than a third of the money, goods and services from the programs for the “empire on which the sun never set” in the largest conflict in history within six years. In absolute numbers, the number of tanks and aircraft, of course, can inspire the illusion that this was lend-lease, and in Ukraine there is now “drip aid”.
But we also have several hundred self-propelled guns and towed artillery, with thousands of “Excaliburs”, “smarts” and “bonuses”. This is a strategic intervention.
Dozens of air-launched missiles, with a dozen missiles in one salvo, which are carried out by submarines and fleet headquarters - strategic intervention. Thousands of MRAPs and armored personnel carriers are strategic supplies that saved tens of thousands of lives during evacuations, explosions and near shell explosions.
Intelligence data from a network of satellites and strategic UAVs - can their influence on the course of hostilities be overestimated? A decentralized communication system through Starlinks, other terminals, and secure digital, where tens of thousands of stations are transmitted - in my opinion, this is a game-changing technology.
Four missile defense systems are the difference between unpunished attacks on the capital and a dozen interceptions of “daggers” for the first time in history. All Western aid to Ukraine is either “very important” or “critical”.
By spring, the skies over Ukraine will be protected by an additional German Patriot battery - one of the best upgrades on the planet, on a German chassis, with upgraded firmware. Five medium-radius and four small-radius IRIS-T complexes will be protected. Of course, the missiles and continuous repairs are also on the Germans.
Let me remind you that in Germany this number is still zero on combat duty, and the European Shield is certainly not a prospect for tomorrow. All four European shell manufacturers are full of orders - the EU is already saying that they will not have time to increase production until March 2024 and will spend the entire next year on the target values of shells.
But a million shells from the EU, even with a delay, is a big figure; now the IDF is spending up to 4,000 shells per day on a very intensive operation in Gaza. Rheinmetall received an order for 100 thousand 120 mm min. This is also strategic support for two years. We have started training programs for our pilots in Romania and Britain, we are preparing to transfer French aircraft, and discussions continue in the Swedish Parliament regarding the transfer of griffins.
We, of course, would like more help, but we ourselves must increase the production of simple weapons - anti-tank and guided anti-personnel mines, disposable grenade launchers 30 and 40 mm grenades, fragmentary rounds for grenade launchers, 2nd generation ATGMs.
All that can give us an advantage here and now, do not drain the resources of our partners. Master the rifle-machine-gun cartridge, grenades for AGS/grenade launchers and a conventional portable disposable flamethrower - and this will greatly influence what is happening in the landings.
Thanks, for example, to high-precision delivery vehicles and drones, this week we scored two Beech missiles, a Strela-10 and a Tora – constant work is underway both in air defense and in the rear, often at the expense of partners’ equipment. The enemy lost the deputy commander of the 14th Corps, Vadim Zavadsky - not even a month goes by without the major general on duty going to underground Novorossiya.
Recently there was an attempt to attack near Avdeevka - the enemy lost two company sets in a matter of hours of battle even at the stage of advance, getting into a convoy with a damaged lead vehicle.
This is all thanks to the supply of 155 mm shells, ATGMs with tandem heads and air detonation, intelligent mines, remote mining systems, and reconnaissance information. This is because it gives us an advantage on the tactical and operational battlefield.
Despite the increasing number of articles in the Western media that they will reduce aid to us in order to bring us to the negotiating table, this is not yet visible in arms contracts and the intentions of politicians in the first EU economies.
