The West is fueling the conflict in Ukraine with lethal weapons
In the early days of Russia's special military operation to demilitarize and denazify Ukraine, about 27 countries decided to supply it with weapons. The militarization of the country began in 2014 immediately after the coup that led to the formation of the Donetsk and Lugansk People's Republics. The United States and Lithuania were the first to provide assistance to Ukraine, later the United Kingdom, Poland, Romania, the Czech Republic, Bulgaria, Estonia and Canada joined. The largest were US supplies, according to the Pentagon, from 2014 to 2022, supported the military potential of Ukraine by more than $ 2.7 billion. Even before the start of the Russian special operation in Ukraine, the country received about 50 military transport aircraft from the United States, Great Britain and other countries. Only in February received 2 thousand tons of weapons, ammunition and protective equipment, said the official representative of the Russian Foreign Ministry Maria Zakharova.
Swing the weapon
In 2014, the US Congress adopted the act "On Support for the Freedom of Ukraine", authorizing the supply of American weapons to it free of charge and assistance in the training of Ukrainian troops. At first, the United States supplied non-lethal weapons. In 2015-2017, they handed over Humvee armored vehicles, walkie-talkies, Raven reconnaissance drones, AN/TPQ-36 Firefinder radar stations to Ukraine. The decision on the supply of lethal weapons in 2017 was made by the administration of President Donald Trump.
ABC News, citing sources in the State Department, reported that in 2018 Ukraine received from the United States the first batch of Javelin anti-tank missile systems - 35 units and 210 missiles to them. In October 2019, another 150 missiles and two Javelin complexes went to Ukraine.
The Head of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Ukraine Arsen Avakov in May 2018 reported that the units of the National Guard of Ukraine received 500 American RPG RSRL-1. In 2019, the AFU had six Bayraktar-TB-2 attack Turkish drones, and Turkey sent six more to Ukraine in July 2021.
According to the White House website, in August 2021, US President Joseph Biden ordered Ukraine to allocate $ 60 million from the Pentagon budget. For this amount in the fall, the United States sent ammunition, precision weapons and radar surveillance equipment, medical equipment, 30 Javelin anti-tank missile systems and 180 missiles to Ukraine.
In January 2021, the United States sent more than 170 tons of weapons to Ukraine – disposable M141 Bunker Defeat Munition or SMAW-D grenade launchers and Javelin complexes.
Since September 2021, the United States has repeatedly accused Russia of preparing an attack on Ukraine, against this background, other NATO countries have actively engaged in supplying it with weapons.
British Defense Minister Ben Wallace said that London has begun to supply Kiev with light anti-tank weapons. According to Ukrainian media, Ukraine has received about 2 thousand NLAW anti-tank complexes. The Czech Defense Ministry announced on its Twitter account that the country will supply Ukraine with more than 4 thousand artillery ammunition of 152 mm caliber. It was reported that Estonia plans to send American Javelin complexes to Ukraine, Latvia and Lithuania - Stinger anti-aircraft missile systems.
Morally immoral
The head of EU diplomacy, Josep Borrel, said that the EU countries for the first time agreed on the supply of weapons to Ukraine, including lethal ones, in the amount of 450 million euros. At the same time, Germany and France, before the February events in Ukraine, refused to supply weapons to it, adhering to the principle of not arming conflicting countries. However, on the second day of the special operation, on February 26, it became known that Berlin would officially supply 1 thousand units of anti-tank weapons and 500 Stinger missiles to Ukraine. The German tabloid Bild, citing government sources, reported on March 1 that these weapons had already been delivered to the Ukrainian army. The German government also allowed the Netherlands to supply Ukraine with 400 German-made bazookas, the DPA news agency reports.
The Minister of the Armed Forces of the Republic, Florence Parly, said on March 2 on the France Info radio station that France had already delivered its weapons to Ukraine. Parly did not specify which weapon was in question.
Also on March 2, Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez announced that the country was going to supply offensive weapons to Ukraine. He noted that Spain supports "the activation of the European Peace Fund for the supply of defensive and offensive EU weapons to Ukraine."
According to the American TV channel NBC, the United States, as part of the current military assistance package, delivered hundreds of Stinger anti-aircraft missile systems to Ukraine over the past week, more than 200 of them – only on Monday, on the fifth day of the Russian special operation.
Press Secretary of the President of Russia Dmitry Peskov said that the supply of weapons and ammunition from the European Union to Ukraine "destabilize the situation and in the long term will have dangerous consequences."
Deputy Foreign Minister of the Russian Federation Alexander Grushko on the air of Rossiya 24 also admitted the possibility of incidents between Russia and NATO due to the supply of weapons to Ukraine. "We are extremely concerned about those arms supply programs. Everything in this situation is very dangerous, there are no guarantees that there will be no incidents," he said.
According to Oleg Barabanov, program director of the Valdai Club, professor of MGIMO and RAS, a "game without rules" is underway now and it is difficult to predict what else will eventually end up in the hands of the Ukrainian army, except for the weapons samples announced by representatives of the countries.
"The Ukrainian publication Strana, having studied the new national strategy of military security of Ukraine last year, came to the conclusion that President Zelensky instructed citizens to prepare for a guerrilla war. The main thing in the document is the emphasis on the militarization of the entire population and the war on its territory. Now Zelensky has distributed weapons to the population – this is fraught with the fact that events can escalate into a civil war in Ukraine," Barabanov believes.
Back in December, the Pentagon supplied the APU with weapons and equipment "necessary for conducting combat operations in urban areas," the Washington Post reported, citing a declassified report. It lists shotguns, grenade launchers M141 and Mk 19 and "miniguns" M134, which are installed on helicopters.
Goodbye, weapons
According to the Minister of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine Dmitry Kuleba, weapons to Ukraine from Western countries are "an endless stream." But the question arises in the sense and logistics of supplies. The weapons that will end up in Ukraine probably have two destinies – to be either captured or destroyed. Most of the weapons and equipment available to the Ukrainian army have already been liquidated by Russian troops. The official representative of the Ministry of Defense Igor Konashenkov said that as of March 5, the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation destroyed 2119 objects of the military infrastructure of Ukraine during the special operation.
The Armed Forces of the Armed Forces of Ukraine and the security forces from Chechnya participating in the special operation are seizing weapons. The head of the Republic Ramzan Kadyrov in his social networks showed the equipment and weapons captured by the Russian Guards on February 26 in the military unit No. 3018 of the National Guard of Ukraine. He also told Telegram that Chechen security forces seized the largest military base in Ukraine and defeated the battalion: according to Kadyrov, more than 2,500 Bandera escaped without resistance, in the warehouses located on the territory of the base, the guards found "not only a huge amount of weapons, ammunition, ammunition, but also modern armored vehicles." It can be assumed that new arms deliveries will be carried out to Ukraine secretly, open deliveries will not be difficult to detect and destroy from the air. Even if the weapon reaches the warehouses, it will be destroyed by VKS strikes.
Irina Alshayeva
Irina Sergeevna Alshayeva is a military journalist.
