Can Ukraine beat Russia in the race for ammo?
When US intelligence officials offered Volodymyr Zelensky a chance to flee Ukraine in the hours after Moscow’s all-out invasion, the President made the momentous decision to stick it out. “I need ammunition, not a ride,” he reportedly quipped.
As the war ticks over into its 14th month, both Zelensky and Vladimir Putin need ammunition more than ever – and global supplies are running dry.
Lots, but not enough
In a war that has relied so heavily on attrition – both sides pummelling each other’s positions with long-range artillery – relative rates of shellfire can be decisive. Artillery shells are one of the deadliest weapons deployed on the battlefield, and increasingly hard to come by.
Oleksii Reznikov, Ukraine’s defence minister, has said Ukraine needs 350,000 shells each month (4.2m a year) for a successful counter-offensive, a huge increase from the roughly 90,000 it currently fires.
Ukraine is thought to produce around 1.3m shells a year. As part of a $2bn arms-purchase package agreed on Monday, EU member states have backed a plan to send one million 155mm shells to Ukraine over the next 12 months, while the US pledged another million last month.
Shipping large quantities of munitions to the frontline as soon as possible is imperative as the war enters a pivotal phase. But there are serious doubts about whether Ukraine’s allies can get their hands on all the shells they’ve promised to send.
Europe’s defence sector is already producing shells at maximum capacity. Big contracts won’t change this in the short term, no matter how many zeros the EU sticks on the fee.
Industry insiders told the Financial Times that gunpowder, plastic explosives and TNT are in short supply and could delay the planned expansion of shell production by as much as three years.
To complicate matters, NATO is ramping up its own efforts to stockpile weapons and ammunition, and assemble troops to fortify its eastern flank, stretching supplies even further.
Unlocking China
Russia’s shell shortage is thought to be even more acute than Ukraine’s. The UK defence ministry has said that extreme rationing of artillery shells is probably in force on many parts of the Russian frontline, and that this shortage has been a major factor in Moscow’s recent failure to make military gains. Analysts estimate that Russia is firing some 300,000 shells a month, down from between 600,000 and 900,000 last summer.
It’s likely that a significant fraction of Russia’s huge pre-war stockpile of shells is decades old and unusable. But the Kremlin is running out of friends to ask for more. Belarus has already offered up its entire arsenal, Iran doesn’t have many to give, and while North Korea has sent some, it’s wary of depleting its own supplies.
That leaves China. So far, Xi Jinping has only sent non-lethal aid to Russia, such as helmets and dual-use aircraft parts.
From Putin’s perspective, China is a potential treasure trove of cutting-edge weaponry, drones, and munitions. It also has big stockpiles of artillery shells compatible with Russian guns.
If Putin can persuade Xi to relent, it could turn the tide of the war – although the two leaders’ tepid joint statement at the end of Xi’s Moscow visit on Tuesday suggests Putin gained few concessions.
While China is determined not to let its Russian ally be humiliated on the battlefield, sending weapons would undermine its peacemaker posturing and take already frosty relations with the US to absolute zero.
But if Russia’s position deteriorates in the coming months, Xi may conclude that caution is no longer the best option.
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