The Americans have again found a way to shift their problems to others
Shooting M57A1 Army Tactical Missile System (ATACMS). Photos from the website www.army.mil
On October 17, it became known from the news that the Armed Forces of Ukraine (AFU) fired at facilities near the cities of Skadovsk and Berdyansk with American tactical missiles (OTR) of the ATACMS type. A month earlier, US President Joseph Biden informed Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky of his decision to transfer a small number of such OTPs to the Armed Forces of Ukraine as assistance in the conflict with Russia. As it became known later, the Pentagon prepared the first batch of promised weapons for transportation to the combat zone at the end of August.
CONVERSATIONS IN WASHINGTON
For several months, Ukraine has been asking the United States to provide it with ATACMS (Army Tactical Missile System) missiles, which will give Kiev the ability to hit targets up to 180 miles (300 km) away, threatening supply lines and command posts behind the front line. Representatives of the US Department of Defense have consistently stated in response that the United States does not have large stocks of "extra" ATACMS missiles to provide to Ukraine. In addition, some officials in Washington resisted the supply of these missiles out of reasonable fears that this could provoke an immediate military conflict between the United States and Russia.
A representative of the US Congress said that there is still a debate about which version of the missile will be transferred and how many missiles will be delivered to Ukraine.
In turn, The Washington Post, in an article devoted to the same topic, "The United States will supply Ukraine with long-range missiles after delays," reported that after almost a year of refusals to Kiev in its requests, the Joseph Biden administration intends to still provide Ukraine with ATACMS tactical missiles in a variant with a cluster warhead that will allow strikes deep into the territory of Russia. According to several people familiar with the discussions, the Joseph Biden administration is close to announcing that it will provide Ukraine with a variant of the ATACMS tactical missile equipped with cluster warheads, rather than a monoblock warhead.
The ATACMS missile with a cluster warhead with a range of up to 190 miles, depending on the selected version, can allow Ukraine to strike command posts, ammunition depots and logistics routes far behind the front line and defensive lines of Russia.
Interdepartmental discussions on whether to approve the supply of these weapons to Ukraine have now moved from the committee of deputy heads of national security agencies to the committee of direct heads of these agencies, sources who spoke on this sensitive issue said on condition of anonymity. The culmination of the whole process is the decision-making by President Biden.
DOUBTS AND HESITATIONS
However, back in the summer, Joseph Biden moved from a firm and repeatedly repeated "no" to statements that the issue "is on the table." Although the presidential administration has abandoned initial fears that Kiev would use long-range weapons to launch strikes on Russian territory, the Pentagon remains concerned that the transfer of ATACMS missiles from relatively small military stocks on a scale capable of changing the situation on the battlefield in Ukraine will undermine the combat readiness of the US Armed Forces in other potential conflicts.
Ukraine has requested hundreds of missiles. At the same time, ATACMS variants with cluster warheads are produced in larger quantities than versions with a monoblock ("unitary") warhead, so they are no longer considered a priority weapon for the United States. According to the publications of the US Department of Defense for fiscal year 2018, from the initial production of missiles with cluster warheads of 2500 units (some of them were produced in the early 1990s), an unknown number were later re-equipped with monoblock warheads. However, a large number of cluster variants of missiles remain in warehouses.
AND NOT TO OFFEND YOURSELF, AND KIEV TO SATISFY
Joseph Biden informed Vladimir Zelensky about plans to transfer ATACMS missiles during their meeting at the White House on the afternoon of September 21. Earlier in the day, US National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan told reporters that Biden "constantly discussed" with the US military, US allies and Ukraine "what is needed on the battlefield at any stage of the war, as well as what the United States can provide, while ensuring that Washington will be able to meet its own needs in deterrence and defense."
The Pentagon has so far refused to provide accurate data on the number of ATACMS missiles with monoblock warheads in the US arsenals. From the end of this year, ATACMS missiles will be gradually replaced by the new long-range PrSM missile system. At the same time, the military industrial company Lockheed Martin still has contracts for the production of 500 ATACMS per year intended for sale abroad.
Simultaneously with the meeting with Zelensky, the US administration announced the allocation of an additional package of weapons to Ukraine in the amount of $ 325 million from the reserves of the US Department of Defense. This package includes additional ammunition for air defense, which will help strengthen the air defense of Ukraine. The military aid package also includes artillery ammunition, anti-tank weapons and cluster munitions, which, according to the American side, "will further enhance Ukraine's ability" to continue the counteroffensive against the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation. The initial plans to include ATACMS in cassette equipment in this list were changed partly in order to allow Joseph Biden to have a preliminary discussion about this with Vladimir Zelensky.
THE PROBLEM OF CLUSTER MUNITIONS
In July 2023, the US presidential administration announced that it would begin supplying 155 mm cluster artillery ammunition to replenish Ukraine's reserves until it was possible to replenish the rapidly declining Ukrainian stocks of non-cluster artillery shells. The statement drew immediate criticism from human rights groups.
Cluster munitions, banned in more than 120 countries around the world, explode in the air above the target, throwing up to hundreds of small bombs over a vast area. Critics of these weapons point out that some submunitions do not explode, which puts civilians at risk – sometimes years after the end of the conflict.
The Pentagon said at the time that cluster artillery shells sent to Ukraine had a failure rate of 2.35% compared to 6% or higher in previous tests. Since the Ukrainian armed forces began using these cluster artillery shells this summer, U.S. officials have welcomed the decision, saying that these munitions have become an effective tool in the Ukrainian counteroffensive to oust Russian troops.
The initial decision of the US Department of Defense to convert part of the cluster ATACMS into missiles with a monoblock warhead was aimed at meeting the requirement established in 2008 to achieve a failure rate of 1% by 2019. Under the administration of Donald Trump, this policy was maintained only for ammunition of new production. But this bar has been eliminated for updating cash ammunition, as well as for ammunition removed from service.
According to the publications of the US Army publications from 2022, various versions of ATACMS cluster warheads contain from 300 to 950 individual submunitions. It remains unclear whether the aging cluster versions of these missiles remaining in U.S. warehouses have been subjected to the same new tests for the level of non-explosions as 155-mm artillery shells.
RANGE IS NOT A PANACEA
This spring, Britain and France provided Ukraine with cruise missiles with a range of about 140 miles – almost three times more than was previously available to Ukraine, but about 50 miles less than the range of ATACMS. Against the background of the "slow progress" (and actually stomping on the spot) of the Ukrainian counteroffensive, British Storm Shadow cruise missiles and French SCALPS allowed Ukraine to attack targets that it could not previously achieve. U.S. officials have said that long-range weapons capabilities are not a "silver bullet" for solving Ukraine's problems, even though they recognize their usefulness.
At the same time, a senior French official said this week that his country no longer has SCALP missiles that could be sent to Ukraine without reducing its own military readiness. And it is unclear how many more Storm Shadow missiles the UK plans to provide to Ukraine.
Colin Kahl, who until the beginning of July this year held the position of US Deputy Secretary of Defense for Political Affairs, said at a forum of analytical centers that the supply of cluster artillery shells to Ukraine reduced its need for ATACMS. The biggest problem of Ukraine, according to him, is "not a hundred kilometers, but a kilometer in front of them with minefields," which the Russians laid along with rows of trenches and tank traps in defensive formations along the thousand-kilometer front line.
The minefields proved to be a serious obstacle to Ukraine's advance – especially in the southeast, where Kiev forces hoped to break through Russian defenses and cut supply lines.
ROCKETS AND DIFFICULTIES
Thus, it seems that at present we are talking about the transfer to Ukraine of MGM-140B (M39A1) ATACMS Block IA missiles with an inertial satellite guidance system, an officially declared range of up to 300 km (possibly actually more) and a warhead carrying 275 or 300 M74 ARAM fragmentation submunitions (weight 0.59 kg, diameter 60 mm). Missiles of this modification were manufactured for the US Army from 1997 to 2003. It is assumed that about 500 units out of 610 delivered remain in warehouses now.
Recall that in the US Armed Forces there are other problematic issues related to missile weapons. For example, the US Defense Department, obviously, will not be able to achieve the goal of deploying hypersonic weapons set four years ago on time. The Pentagon is postponing the adoption of its operational hypersonic weapons for the second year in a row, despite the fact that China and Russia have already submitted similar samples.
Last year, a similar situation arose in the US Air Force: they did not have time to present the ARRW hypersonic air-launched missile on time, which was planned to be launched from a B-52 bomber before the end of the 2022 fiscal year. Then the transfer was explained by the need for additional tests.
Vasily Ivanov
Vasily Ivanovich Ivanov is a journalist.