As the military conflict in Ukraine turned into a war of attrition, Ukraine's growing demand for conventional weapons and artillery shells began to deprive western arsenals. Because, the reduction in military investment in the previous decades has left NATO and EU countries without the production capacity to replenish key weapons in a timely manner.
Back in May, when Washington ordered 1,300 Stinger anti-aircraft missiles from the military industry to replenish the shortfall in previous aid to Ukraine, the CEO of Raytheon, which manufactures the missiles, replied: "It will take us a little time." ”
Meanwhile, after Paris aided Kiev with 18 Caesar self-propelled howitzers — reducing its total inventory of high-tech guns by a quarter — it took the French company Nexter about 18 months to build new guns to make up for the inventory.
The war in Ukraine exposed the scarcity of Western defense reserves — especially vital supplies that had little economic value, such as artillery shells, which had been a mainstay of combat. Lack of productive capacity, labor shortages and chaotic supply chains — especially computer chips — mean that Western countries will need a long time to fill the shortfall.
According to defense officials and analysts, the shortage of military supplies has exposed the West's complacency about potential threats since the end of the Cold War, as evidenced by Ukraine's desire to now support Ukraine through military support. They added that the fascination with high-tech weapons and precision manufacturing masks the importance of maintaining stocks of basic equipment. In recent decades, the West has been pouring too much energy into high-tech such as artificial intelligence and combat robots. But they did not think that in real war, when dealing with opponents with strong strength, high-tech weapons are not the most important, and continuous firepower superiority is the most fundamental.
Jamie Shay, a former nato director of policy planning, said: "Ukraine has told us that war still relies on classic elements such as artillery, ground forces and occupation to win victories. ”
The scarcity of sustained firepower may now be affecting the West's ability to control war in Kiev. U.S. procurement expert Alex Versinen said the number of 155-millimeter shells produced by the United States each year was exhausted in Ukraine in less than two weeks. He said the conflict marked a "return to the industrial war."
"It was like the great shell crisis of the First World War, which in 1915 was a shortage in which the British stocks were depleted due to the heavy use of artillery in trench warfare, which led to a large number of casualties in Britain and the resignation of the current Prime Minister," Shining said.
British Defence Minister Ben Wallace has also said that it will be difficult for the West to wage a protracted war comparable to Russia's attack on Ukraine because ammunition stocks are simply "not enough to deal with the threat we face." In a simulated war game last year, Britain's stockpile of ammunition ran out after eight days.
Of course, no one believes that the West will exhaust its basic weapons by supplying Ukraine with supplies. Even so, much of NATO's spending is spent on advanced systems, such as fighter jets; But Western countries have not supplied Ukraine with these high-tech aerial weapons. Over the past 20 years, much of the West's defensive objectives have been aimed at counterinsurgency weapons in the Middle East, rather than preparing for a showdown between heavy tanks and artillery like those that emerged on the battlefields of Ukraine.
Decades of emphasis on precision manufacturing, financial efficiency, and industrial integration have complicated the West's supply of basic weapons, a phenomenon that runs counter to the thinking of European and American military planners keen to maintain expensive weapons stockpiles.
In Britain, low stocks mean it recently had to buy howitzers from a third party to send to Ukraine, reportedly taking the order from a Belgian private dealer. In the United States, the Pentagon only works with five major defense contractors. In the 1990s, the number was 51.
A Western defense adviser said: "For a long time, it was widely believed that the West would never fight another industrial war. As a result, few countries have been able to maintain the ability to improve their domestic production of critical weapons and equipment. ”
All this neglect has led to a scramble for scarce supplies of components and materials by Western arms manufacturers to create weapons and ammunition that until recently outsold. According to Raytheon, the last time some of the Stinger missile's electronic components were mass-produced 20 years ago, many of these components are no longer produced, and re-procurement is time-consuming and costly.
Alex Creswell, chief executive of Thales UK, which produces anti-tank NLAW missiles, said: "The UK has been depleting its weapons stocks, but its investment in production has been insufficient. ”
As for Kiev's request for a guided multiple rocket launcher system manufactured by Lockheed Martin, the United States has now consumed about a third of its total inventory of 20,000 to 25,000 guided rockets.
There is also a more troublesome issue, said Mark Cancien, a former Pentagon official working at the Center for Strategic and International Studies think tank, saying that these depleted ammunition stockpiles cannot be easily replaced by older versions because prohibited cluster warheads were used for stockpiled ammunition once equipped for the War. Therefore, the only way to make up for inventory is to reproduce.
Except for NATO and EU countries. Defense analysts in the West believe that Russia is also facing weapons supply problems. Russian defense manufacturer Ural Locomotive and Rolling Stock Factory is reportedly renovating old tanks in three shifts. A large stockpile in Belarus is partially replenishing the ammunition supply.
Mark Galeotti, a Russian expert in the United Kingdom, also mentioned that the russian troops in Ukraine have replaced a new commander-in-chief, and the former Deputy Minister of Defense, Gennady Zhidek, will assume this important post. The arrival of Zhdko will strengthen the voice of the Russian military, because the Russian army needs strong support to obtain a sufficient military budget to carry out special military operations.
Western military experts have been following the Ukraine conflict in order to seek new insights into the nature of modern warfare from this war. Jack Waterlin, a senior fellow at the Royal Joint Services Research Institute's think tank, said the "first lesson" we've learned so far is the importance of maintaining basic weapons stockpiles.
"It's nothing new, but we've ignored it for a long time," Watlin said. Cheap ammunition that can be used on a large scale is absolutely essential for a war. Western countries need to be more sober and not always chase too much military technology. ”