(Dipaneeta Das’s article from the REPUBLICWORLD on 14 April 2022.)
As the all-out Russian war entered day 50, the US on
Wednesday bolstered assistance to war-torn Ukraine with additional military aid
in artillery, helicopters, and more. Since the inception of the Russian invasion
of Ukraine on February 24, the US has already supplied Kyiv with thousands of
anti-tank Javelin missiles.
With about one-third of its Javelin inventory now sent to Ukraine, Washington is on the edge of running out of the "iconic weapon," thus requiring the US to immediately reduce transfers to ensure sufficient stockpiles for its own purpose.
"The United
States has supplied Ukraine with thousands of Javelins, the anti-tank missiles
that have become the iconic weapon of the war, but the U.S. inventory is
dwindling," says a report published by the Center for Strategic and
International Studies (CSIS) on April 12.
Before knowing
further about the US stockpiles of Javelin missiles, it is pertinent to
understand why it is called an "iconic weapon" in the war.
What is the Javelin anti-tank missile?
Simply put,
Javelin anti-tank missiles are long-range guided precision projectiles that can
be carried by one person. It is considered among the most sophisticated,
capable, and expensive weapons out of the wide range of anti-tank munitions
that the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO) and other countries are
providing to Ukraine, as per the CSIS report. So far, the US has reportedly
supplied at least 7,000 such interception missiles to Ukraine.
Since Ukraine
was mostly equipped with light infantry, supplies of heavy weapons have allowed
Ukrainian forces to combat Russian mechanised artillery. Nevertheless, while
Javelins are considered as most capable and best known of the anti-tank weapon
systems, it is hardly the most numerous.
In addition, due
to huge production time, it takes years to replenish the stock of these
"iconic" missiles. So is it possible that Ukraine may run out of US
supplies before inflicting serious damage to its enemy on the battlefield?
Why the US could experience a shortage of Javelin
missiles?
The report
compiled by Mark F. Cancian claimed that since the US has not publicly revealed
the latest figures about its Javelin anti-tank missiles in its arsenal, the
numbers are likely to be "deduced" given its massive supply to
Ukraine.
Also, the US has
only produced 37,739 Javelin anti-tank missiles since 1994, according to US
Army budget books. After using quite a number for training purposes, Washington
is expected to hold near about 20,000 to 25,000 remaining and 7,000 of which
represent one-third of its total inventory.
While a majority
of two-thirds remain in the stock, military planners are "nervous"
fearing potential empty Javelin inventory. "The United States maintains
stocks for a variety of possible global conflicts that may occur against North
Korea, Iran, or Russia itself. At some point, those stocks will get low enough
that military planners will question whether the war plans can be executed. The
United States is likely approaching that point," the CSIS report
explained.
How can the US make up for the imminent shortage?
The easiest
answer is by increasing the production of the Javelin anti-tank missiles
systems. According to the report, Washington only produces 1,000 Javelin
missiles per year despite having a capacity of 6,480. The delivery time for
each artillery is at least 32 months. This means, if depleted, the US will need
about three-four years to rebuild its stock. In the meantime, more supplies to
Ukraine will expand the gap between supply and demand.
According to the
CSIS report, the US might have had over-supplied artillery in a bid to beef up
its support to Ukraine against a Russian attack. For example, Washington has
limited inventories and replenishment options for Stinger anti-aircraft
missiles.
Now, the US has
already supplied 2,000 of these to Ukraine despite now having purchased for
itself since 2003, when the total production was 11,600. Given testing and
training losses, which amount to a loss of 1% of Stinger anti-aircraft
missiles, the remaining stock could be around 8,000, which means the US has
already given a quarter of its stock to Ukraine.
Ukraine War Is Depleting America’s Arsenal ofDemocracy
(Hal
Brands’s article from the BLOOMBERG NEWS on 14 April 2022.)
Western allies
face a choice: Send more weapons to Kyiv or save their stockpiles for their own
defense. America is following an “arsenal of democracy” strategy in Ukraine.
It has avoided direct intervention against the
Russian invaders, while working with allies and partners to provide the Kyiv
government with money and guns. That strategy, reminiscent of U.S. support for
Britain in 1940-41, has worked wonders. Yet as the war reaches a critical
stage, with the Russians preparing to consolidate their grip on eastern
Ukraine, the arsenal of democracy is being depleted.
That could cause
a fatal shortfall for Ukrainian forces in this conflict, and it is revealing
American weaknesses that could be laid bare in the next great-power fight. Of
all the support the U.S. and its friends
have provided Ukraine, arms have mattered the most. Deliveries of
drones, antitank and anti-aircraft weapons, ammunition and other capabilities
have helped Ukraine wreak havoc on Russian forces even as Moscow has pummeled
the country’s industrial base.
General Mark Milley, the chairman of the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff, told Congress that the West has delivered 60,000 antitank weapons and 25,000 anti-aircraft weapons to Kyiv. The Pentagon is now laying plans to rush additional artillery, coastal defense drones and other materiel to Ukraine. The White House on Wednesday announced a new $800 million package including helicopters and armored personnel carriers.
But President Joe Biden never planned for a war like
this. The assumption was that Russia would quickly conquer much of the country,
so the U.S. would be supporting a simmering, low-intensity Ukrainian
insurgency. Instead, Ukraine’s successful resistance has led to an ongoing,
high-intensity conventional fight, with prodigious consumption of munitions and
intense attrition of key military assets.
Pentagon
officials say that Kyiv is blowing through a week’s worth of deliveries of
antitank munitions every day. It is also running short of usable aircraft as
Russian airstrikes and combat losses take their toll. Ammunition has become
scarce in Mariupol and other areas. This is presenting Western countries with a
stark choice between pouring more supplies into Ukraine or husbanding finite
capabilities they may need for their own defense.
Germany has
declined to transfer tanks to Ukraine on grounds that it simply cannot spare
them. Canada quickly ran short on rocket launchers and other equipment that the
Ukrainians desperately need. The U.S. has provided one-third of its overall
stockpile of Javelin anti-tank missiles. It cannot easily deliver more without leaving
its own armories badly depleted — and it may take months or years to
significantly ramp up production.
Before the U.S.
entered World War II, President Franklin Roosevelt and his military advisers
engaged in intense debates about whether the U.S. should rush weapons to a
beleaguered Britain or hang onto them in case America had to defend itself.
Biden’s arsenal-of-democracy strategy is reaching a similar inflection point in
Ukraine.
Kyiv will require far more Western support to beat back Russian forces gathering in the east, where relatively open terrain is less favorable to the defense. It will also need more sophisticated weapons, such as tanks and aircraft, to deny Russia a decisive advantage — and perhaps take the offensive if Moscow’s eastern offensive falters. Stout Ukrainian resistance has given Kyiv a reasonable chance of winning this war, but the cost of any victory, in equipment no less than lives, will be astounding.
For the same
reason, the war in Ukraine is a sobering preview of the problems the U.S.
itself would face in a conflict against Russia or China. If forced to go to war
in Eastern Europe or the Western Pacific, Washington would spend down its
stockpiles of missiles, precision-guided munitions and other critical
capabilities in days or weeks. It would probably suffer severe losses of tanks,
planes, ships and other assets that are sophisticated, costly and hard to
replace.
During World War
I, the offensives of 1914 led to “shell famine” as the European combatants
exhausted their arsenals. Get ready for “missile famine” if there is a
great-power war. In the world wars of the last century, America’s unmatched
manufacturing base ultimately powered it to victory. But today, replenishing
the free world’s arsenal might not be so easy.
American economic leadership is no longer based
primarily on manufacturing. Shortages of machine tools, skilled labor and spare
production capacity could slow a wartime rearmament effort. The U.S. can’t
quickly scale up production of Stinger missiles for Ukraine, for example,
because the workforce needed to do so no longer exists.
American
stockpiles of key weapons are smaller than one might imagine, partly because of
production constraints and partly because most of the Pentagon’s roughly $750
billion budget goes to manpower, health care and things other than bullets and
bombs.
Don’t bet
against the world’s leading economy — and all of its democratic allies — in a
long war. But don’t think that America would effortlessly produce what it needs
to win. The problem isn’t insoluble. Greater investments in the defense
industrial base and more aggressive purchasing and stockpiling of key munitions
can help.
The creation of
a reserve industrial corps (civilians who have basic peacetime training so they
can contribute to wartime production) is worth exploring. Key allies, such as
Japan, may be able to help the U.S. surge production in shipbuilding and other
areas.
