Former Warsaw Pact countries supply weapons and ammunition of Soviet origin compatible with Ukrainian equipment. When these supplies run out, the Ukrainian armed forces must go through a rapid process of “Westernization” lest the fighting stop.
Defending your country is hard enough. It’s even harder to defend yourself while transitioning from heavy Russian weaponry to an unfamiliar arsenal of Western howitzers, armored vehicles and standard NATO ammunition. In order to survive, everything from training to supply chains must change and all during combat.
That is the task ahead of Ukraine. And it has never been done.
The logistical challenge is immense. Western ammunition and other military consumables are incompatible with most Russiandesigned heavy weapons. So once the transition to Western weapons rockets, shells, artillery, tank guns, mortars and mediumcaliber weapons begins, Ukrainian soldiers will no longer be able to get a box of Western ammunition off a truck and use it in a Russian one Cannon. — The sizes are completely different. But the logistical operations for weapons systems, old and new, must continue to get the right supplies to the right places on Ukraine’s fastmoving battlefield.
From there it only gets harder. The more complex the platform, the more difficult the transition. Western tanks run on different fuels, have different maintenance cycles, and even use different tools in the shop.
It’s big business and difficult to make successful even in peacetime.
Currently, Ukrainian soldiers are content with “oldfashioned” Russian ammunition and platforms. To keep the fight going, the former Warsaw Pact countries donate any remaining Russian weapon systems, ammunition or other equipment. Everything that could still work with the Ukrainian arsenal of Russianmade heavy weapons is dusted off and shipped to the Ukrainian border.
But these antiques, often stored in questionable conditions, are in limited supply.
Ammunition and other military supplies are running low in Ukraine. The West’s ability to support equipment of Russian origin is already very limited.and the handful of Eastern European arms manufacturers who can still produce Russiacompatible ammunition and spare parts will likely attempt to break production records.
New sources of supply are unlikely. While the war has made the production of Russian caliber ammunition and spare parts a profitable endeavor, there is little point in expanding production capacity for Russianorigin heavy weapons. Once Ukraine runs out of T64, T72 and T80 tank fleets, Western demand for Russian caliber tank ammunition will come to an end. Until Ukraine fires the final rounds of its 152mm and 122mm howitzers, that’s pretty much it.
Ukraine has few options. At some point the West will run out of Russian weapons. As the war rages on, Ukraine must adopt Western weapons systemsmaking the transfer amid an intense and desperate struggle.
Upgrading is a big challenge:
In the last decade, as former communist allies joined NATO, much work has been done to understand how the old armed forces in the Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland, Bulgaria and other former “Eastern Bloc” countries are gradually coming to power would take over of the West. interoperable weapons.
These studies need to be dusted off. It was then that NATO realized that putting everything in one arsenal was a huge undertaking Just to solve the army’s ammunition differences, new NATO members had to change or upgrade nearly ninety different weapon systems.
Given the effectiveness of Stinger, Javelin and other manportable missile systems in Ukraine, the general public may not understand the challenge ahead. In reality, Ukraine’s rapid introduction of a suite of standard NATO antitank missiles has been something of an anomaly, successful because most Western antitank weapons are halfway or “oneanddone” platforms. where the user can fire the antitank missile or grenade, throw away the spent missile tube and get another one. To launch them into combat, Ukraine needed little training, support, or maintenance infrastructure, and the missiles could be fired into combat so quickly that Russia had little time to change tactics.
Ukraine coped well with the transition. But it only gets harder.
Western donations of simple infantry weapons hinted at the more complex mission that lies ahead. although While older Russianera machine guns can be cleaned with little more than Coke and a rag, moving to a modern NATO rifle or machine gun means soldiers must learn different shooting profiles and adopt new maintenance practices while at the same time new supply chains for ammunition and spare parts are being established.
It’s only getting harder and harder.
The current challenge for donor nations is to maximize the time available before Ukraine’s older systems expire, run out of ammunition, or run out of another key consumable. Look at the artillery something that Ukraine has successfully used on the battlefield. Currently, Ukraine is largely dependent on howitzers of Russian origin and Russian 152mm or 122mm ammunition. If no more ammunition is available once existing stockpiles of ammunition are depleted, Ukrainian artillery and any support networks Ukraine has developed to keep these weapons in combat will be useless.
In order to continue fighting, Ukraine’s artillery forces must upgrade to western 155mm guns and adopt the western’s sophisticated artillery sighting systems. This isn’t something that can be done overnight.
The first attempts are running. The White House announced on April 13 the transfer of 18 basic 155mm artillery pieces and 40,000 rounds of 155mm ammunition and AN/TPQ36 counterartillery radar systems, setting the stage for a wholesale artillery and target upgrade of Ukraine before . the infrastructure. Training will start in the next few days. But the real trick will be to develop that initial skill quickly, allowing new weapons to appear on the front lines in sufficient numbers to make a real difference right away.
Build foundation and pour help:
In mechanized warfare, bringing some new skills into a fight is a distraction. In World War II, brand new supertanks, jets, and other sophisticated equipment brought to the battlefield very quickly would break, be captured, or, through exposure to resistance, reduce their tactical effectiveness.
Ukraine faces a similar challenge today. Ukraine’s battlefield needs are urgent, but any new heavy weapons arriving in Ukraine are most effective when introduced into mass combat, with enough support to fully utilize the new weapon’s full potential. With the public announcement that the first battery of NATOready 155mm guns is coming, other smart Western arsenals are busy dusting off their older artillery systems and quietly preparing to soon launch as many howitzers as possible and standard NATO To get ammunition in Ukrainian hands months. The goal is to pit Russian forces against an entirely new artillery force with new capabilities and deadly tactics.
The West knows that complex platforms will come into play from previous NATO restructuring efforts. In addition to howitzers, it’s time for the West to determine what other hightech tools available in Ukraine may be needed and start developing a base for them now. It happens slowly; she 200 M113 armored personnel carriers included in the current aid package allow Ukraine a first step towards standard NATO tanks and armored vehicles older. The current aid package also allows the West to better understand how contractor support, required to fully exploit certain technical aspects of various military items, could work on Ukraine’s future battlefield.
Aside from the dire circumstances in Ukraine, there is a certain irony here. As Russia digs deeper and fights to keep Ukraine from joining NATO, Ukraine’s military is undergoing one of the fastest transformations into a standard NATO arsenal in modern history.which, under military attack, is turning into a de facto NATO member, whether Russian President Vladimir Putin likes it or not.
By continuing the war and continuing the struggle, Ukraine’s status as a member of NATO is inevitable.
SOURCE: forbes