Poland’s president said Wednesday that Warsaw has decided to send Ukraine a company of German-made Leopard 2 tanks as part of an “international coalition,” although it’s not yet clear if Berlin has signed off on the delivery.
“A company of Leopard tanks will be handed over as part of coalition-building,” Polish President Andrzej Duda said during a visit to the western Ukrainian city of Lviv. “We want it to be an international coalition.”
Supplying the Leopards would mark the first time Western-made heavy tanks were sent to Ukraine. The delivery needs to be approved by Germany, but according to Reuters, a German government spokesman said Berlin hasn’t yet received any requests from allies to send the tanks.
Duda made the comments alongside Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, who said Ukraine is “awaiting a joint decision” because “one country cannot provide us with a sufficient number of them.”
Ukrainian officials have said they need 300 tanks, and Poland’s pledge to send a company, which typically consists of 14 tanks, falls far short. Duda said more countries need to be willing to do the same.
“We have taken the decision to contribute a first package of tanks, a company of Leopard tanks, which, I hope, together with other companies of Leopard and other tanks that will be offered by other countries will …. be able to strengthen Ukraine’s defense,” he said.
German Chancellor Olaf Scholz has previously ruled out the idea of sending the Leopard 2, but his government has shown a willingness to escalate its support for Kyiv. When explaining his opposition to sending the tanks in September, Scholz said he was trying to prevent a direct clash between Russia and NATO.
Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba believes Kyiv will ultimately receive the German-made tanks and criticized Scholz’s government for being hesitant. “It’s always a similar pattern: First they say ‘no,’ then they fiercely defend their decision, only to say ‘yes’ in the end. We are still trying to understand why the German government is doing this to itself,” he said.
Britain is discussing sending its main battle tank to Ukraine, the Challenger 2, and Ukrainian officials hope that would inspire Germany to do the same. But German officials told POLITICO that it would have little impact on their decision-making and said they would ultimately follow the lead of the US.
Ooh, a tank company. A whole company. Maybe.
But why does Ukraine need tanks? There were reports that it started the war with as many as 1800 of them. And we’ve been repeatedly told that Ukraine has more tanks than Russia.
April:
https://www.businessinsider.com/ukraine-has-more-tanks-on-ground-than-russia-official-says-2022-4
December:
https://www.yahoo.com/now/now-ukraine-fields-more-tanks-234200571.html
So why have Zelensky and Zaluzhny been begging for tanks? What happened to all the tanks we were told they had? Were they destroyed? If so, why wouldn’t new shipments suffer the main fate?
What’s going on over there?
The MIC is getting lazy…
the simple answer is that though at times the Ukrainians may (and I not at all convinced that this was the case) have had more tanks in the field, this does not mean that this situation would last.
Tanks are lost all the time and even when not lost they need maintenance – and while the Russians may have fielded fewer tanks (at times) they had more in reserve and can likely maintain far more themselves than Ukraine can even with the help of some of the East European former Warsaw pact countries.
New western tanks would (so the claim is) be lost at a lower rate as they are superior to old Soviet equipment, but that presupposes that they are used by experienced tank crews and in the ways NATO / the US does it – so not how they are likely to be used in Ukraine.
It is furthermore very far from sure that even a substantial number of Leopard, Challenger or even Abrams will really do much to help the Ukrainians – as these tanks are much heavier than the Soviet ones Ukraine operates and hence not well suited for usage in Ukraine (bridges will often not be able to support them or only one at a time) and Ukrainian tank transporters are not able to transport them.
This ignores the issue with maintenance, spare parts and using such new and unfamiliar equipment. For these reasons it seems unlikely that western tanks can be much of a game changer in 2023, perhaps later or perhaps in single operations in one area – but likely not in a more general sense.
So why does Zelenskyy and Zaluzhny ask for them – my guess is that they’ll do what they can to get the west deeper committed to the war, and possibly because they have unrealistic expectations of them – but more likely they know that they are burning through their old soviet ones and will in a not too distant future have no or very few tanks to meet the challenge.
Tanks have taken a lot of criticism not all of it justified, as in if you have to envelop an enemy stronghold you may take some casualties using tanks, but you will take far more and do the job a lot slower maybe not at all if you do not use tanks.
Well these are better tanks, but I would tend to agree this is mostly symbolic.
If I was a conspiracy theorist, and I sometimes I am, I might theorize that Zelenskyy is begging for tanks because his masters in Washington have told him to beg for tanks, because their masters in the “defense” contracting industry want to get a bunch of them sent off, and one last big bunch of replacements ordered to replenish US/EU/NATO stocks, before the NDAA round when the US Army, etc. don’t ask for any more because they’re obsolete.
A conspiracy theorist or just an experienced observer of our MIC.
I wonder about the profit markup difference between tanks and artillery shells.
Not to mention the profit from training new crews to use the tanks
How is there profit in training crews, is training not supposed to be done by the military and not the companies building the tanks?
In order to train tank crews you need tanks, tank fuel, tank ammunition, etc.
I kind of doubt that the US would buy additional tanks to train Ukrainians, do you not think they would train them on existing ones or the ones they would later ship to Ukraine. Fuel would come from the existing army allocations at least that would be how it would be done in Denmark. That leaves us with the ammunition – just not seeing that as a major profit incentive.
That is I would doubt it would be a thing that the MIC would waste much effort to lobby for – they could likely get more per invested lobby hour by arguing for more tanks or more ammunition shipped directly to Ukraine.
If tanks are shipped to Ukraine, the Pentagon will be buying new tanks to replace them — at least for a short while, until it stops asking for tanks in its budget and starts wanting stuff that isn’t obsolete instead.
If fuel is drawn from existing Pentagon stocks, the Pentagon will be buying more fuel to replenish those stocks.
I was under the impression that the US had Abrams sitting in the dessert – moth balled, is this not so?
If fuels is allocated to the military is it not used in that budget year? That is how it works in Denmark – and sometimes we have the military just burning it to avoid lower allocations next year.
Even if this is not the case we normally do not say that the oil producers are part of the MIC – and I kind of doubt that the oil companies would make the a lot of money by getting the US to deliver tanks – and thus having to burn a bit more fuel to train Ukrainian tankers – I mean yes a bit but not enough to spend significant lobbying efforts upon it.
But please indicate if you really think that this profit motive would be as important as to drive this decision – or if you think that more new tanks will be ordered because old Abrams are being delivered to Ukraine, because I cannot see the need given that it would be mothballed versions going to Ukraine.
I can see that the war in Ukraine would have the US and many other nations increasing their tank forces, but like with the Challenger II supplied by UK, the draw down on UK stocks was going to happen anyway and thus no new tanks were ordered because tanks already to be replaced were supplied to Ukraine instead of the scrap yard.
You could argue that the steel producers were then behind it, but that is how far we have to go to find someone with a clear profit incentive large enough to make a perceptible difference – and still I doubt that they would have been lobbying.
“But please indicate if you really think that this profit motive would be as important as to drive this decision – or if you think that more new tanks will be ordered because old Abrams are being delivered to Ukraine, because I cannot see the need given that it would be mothballed versions going to Ukraine.”
Yes, if old mothballed Abrams tanks are sent to Ukraine, new AbramsX tanks will be ordered to replace them. It’s just like you pointed out with fuel allocations — if existing stocks aren’t used, allocations go down. “We’re sending our old tanks to Ukraine, gotta have new ones” is a major motivator for tanks and for all other weapons systems and munitions.
Back in the day, at the end of the fiscal year my mortar platoon would go to the field and fire off as many rounds as humanly possible so that our ammo allocation wouldn’t go down the following year. And that was especially urgent the year that the newer rounds (with plastic “donut” increments instead of the old powder bags and improved fuses) came out. The Marine Corps wanted that new ammo and the word from high was “make all that old sh*t disappear.”
Very true. Our garbage is someone else’s gold.
It’s all about economics, Marx was right about that one.
Your guess is as good as mine…
Ukraine is becoming a focal point.
Donna it been a focal point since Putin invasion.
Does Putin owe you $10 dollars or something?
A lot more that $10 I suspect.
Ukraine has been a focal point of US foreign policy and clandestine operations since ______ .
1945
1992
2004
2013
The correct answer is 2022 when Ukraine became the lead story on the nightly news.
Are these Leopard tanks with or without their spots?
It’s changeable.
The tanks are on their way, folks. How many times have we heard, “the Biden
administrationregime is considering…,” only to find out the equipment is in Ukraine already? Probably more than the number of hairs remaining on my head.Stand fast Germany!.. The country you should be concerned about should be your own!
Both the people in Japan and Germany must not care that their leaders are leading them into another disaster. I know the American people don’t really care either.
That is because MSM is manipulating public opinion to support the gov. narrative.
Maybe the German industry would like to make some profit too after all that is what wars are about,and German tax payers pay too. Look at the profit the American energy giants and the weapons industry is making, the Europeans want a little of the pie too, crumbs are better than nothing. That is understandable.
More eye wash from the West. The military operation in Ukraine is the first industrial war in Europe since 1945. Sending more tanks will not really mater and may compound the problems for Ukraine.
Worse yet, sending Western tanks to Ukraine moves the world one more step toward an existential or extinction level event.
Best analysis is by The New Atlas
Will Western Main Battle Tanks Turn the Tide in Ukraine? What do Russian Gains in Soledar Mean?
Poland Says It’s Ready to be De-Militarized by Russia