With New Weapons, Ukraine Has A lot of What It Wants for Counteroffensive, Analysts Say

The brand new long-range missiles, assault drones and tanks and different armored automobiles that President Volodymyr Zelensky has secured from allies in current days will fulfill many, however not all, of the calls for for weapons that Ukraine stated it wants for a counteroffensive in opposition to Russia.

Army analysts imagine at the least a few of the newest tranche of Western weapons will likely be rapidly despatched to the entrance traces to chop off Russian provide routes and to strike at their artillery techniques and command facilities in Ukraine’s south and east. Others could also be delivered later, together with within the autumn or past, to assist Mr. Zelensky plan for future operations ought to the battle proceed to pull on.

However the sturdy bundle — introduced as Mr. Zelensky visited 4 European capitals over the past three days — could sign that Western officers now imagine Ukraine might retake important swaths of territory within the counteroffensive, stated Jacob Funk Kirkegaard, a former Danish military intelligence officer.

“We wouldn’t be committing this quantity of weapons to Ukraine at this level, if the considering was that it was unlikely that they’d succeed,” stated Mr. Kirkegaard, who’s now a senior fellow on the German Marshall Fund analysis group in Brussels.

Some Western officers hope that if the Ukrainians make substantial positive factors of territory, they’d have extra leverage in any peace negotiations.

Simply final week, Mr. Zelensky had warned that the anticipated counteroffensive in opposition to Russia that was anticipated to start this spring or early summer time may very well be delayed except Kyiv rapidly obtained extra weapons.

European allies responded in a matter of hours.

Maybe essentially the most important dedication got here from Germany, which on Saturday introduced — simply earlier than Mr. Zelensky landed in Berlin — that it might ship Ukraine 30 further Leopard tanks and 20 armored preventing automobiles, 16 air protection techniques, greater than 200 drones and a slew of different arms and ammunition. The leaders of France and Italy additionally gave vaguer guarantees to ship mild tanks, ammunition and air protection techniques.

The extra Leopards and infantry preventing automobiles that Germany is sending as a part of its bundle price 2.7 billion euros, or practically $3 billion, will likely be most helpful on Ukraine’s southern steppe, the place the Russian-controlled terrain, Mr. Kirkegaard stated, is nicely suited “for tank or maneuver warfare.”

However Max Bergmann, the director of the Europe, Russia and Eurasia program on the Heart for Strategic and Worldwide Research in Washington, famous that it was not clear that all the newly-pledged German tanks would arrive quickly. (Berlin has already delivered 18 Leopard tanks to Ukraine.)

Nonetheless, he stated, the dedication “helps give Ukraine a level of confidence” as army planners put together for a drawn-out battle.

As of early March, solely 31 % of tanks and 76 % of different armored preventing automobiles had been delivered to Ukraine for the approaching counteroffensive, in line with labeled U.S. army assessments that had been lately leaked, though American officers have stated way more have been delivered within the months since. The Biden administration has additionally pledged to ship 31 American-made Abrams tanks to Ukraine, however they aren’t anticipated to reach till fall on the earliest.

The brand new air protection techniques that had been promised could assist ease American worries that Ukraine didn’t have sufficient to guard itself because the counteroffensive neared. 4 of the 16 air protection techniques that Germany has newly pledged are thought of among the many most refined in the marketplace.

The newly promised long-range Storm Shadow missiles, which Britain pledged on Thursday, assist reply a longstanding request from Ukraine. America has thus far resisted sending American long-range missiles to Ukraine, partly to keep away from doubtlessly escalating the battle with weapons that Ukraine might use to succeed in into Russian territory.

Mr. Kirkegaard stated the long-range drones that Britain pledged on Monday are of explicit menace to the Russian Navy’s Black Sea Fleet within the Crimean port of Sevastopol and different websites in and close to Crimea, together with the Kerch Strait Bridge that connects occupied Crimea to Russia.

Crimea has been a key staging floor for the Russians working in captured territory in southern Ukraine.