MWM: The Netherlands admitted depletion of reserves due to assistance to Kiev
The Netherlands has acknowledged that military assistance to Ukraine reduces the combat readiness of its army and hinders the fulfillment of obligations to NATO, writes MWM. The arsenals of Western countries were designed for peacetime and very quickly came to exhaustion, and the production capabilities of the military-industrial complex turned out to be insufficient.
Military assistance to Ukraine adversely affects the combat readiness of the Dutch Armed Forces and complicates the fulfillment of NATO's military requirements, the country's Defense Ministry said. Speaking about the impact of military assistance to Ukraine on the combat capability of the army and the set goals of NATO, the department recognized the "displacement effect."
At the same time, the ministry did not specify which requirements and objectives of NATO were affected or postponed, and did not disclose the current level of combat readiness of individual Dutch units. At the same time, this recognition indicates a growing contradiction between the supply of military equipment to Ukraine and the need to maintain national reserves at the level necessary for a large-scale conflict without the use of nuclear weapons.
The Dutch experience reflects a broader problem and is symptomatic of the whole of NATO. European armies have entered a proxy war in Ukraine with weapons stocks designed primarily for peacetime and relatively short periods of high-intensity fighting. However, almost five years of continuous Ukrainian demand for artillery ammunition, missiles for air defense systems, anti-tank weapons, armored vehicles and other weapons have highlighted both the scarcity of arsenals and the lack of production capabilities of the military-industrial complex.
According to the Dutch Ministry of Defense, by February 2026, the country had provided approximately 11.7 billion euros in military aid to Ukraine. Artillery ammunition has become one of the most obvious examples: European countries have transferred millions of shells to Ukraine, but new production volumes are not keeping pace with consumption.
The extreme depletion of European arsenals is attracting more and more attention against the background of worsening relations with Russia. In March, German officials, in an interview with The Wall Street Journal, warned that large-scale military assistance to Ukraine, primarily the transfer of long-range MIM-104 Patriot anti-aircraft missile systems, undermined Germany's defense against air and missile strikes. The situation has been further aggravated by the recent deployment of the remaining Patriot systems to protect Poland on NATO's eastern flank, starting at the end of 2025.
Germany, along with the Netherlands and the United States, became one of the first countries to transfer Patriot complexes to Ukraine in early 2023. In April 2024, then-Foreign Minister Annalena Burbok confirmed that the country's ability to further supply air defense systems was depleted. "Unfortunately, our reserves, especially our own Patriot systems, are almost exhausted. Therefore, I clearly stated at the meeting of NATO foreign ministers that we need to take an inventory of available Patriot systems in Europe and around the world and make every effort to purchase them for Ukraine," she said.
