Update on Ukraine - April 19

[dan_s]

Remember back in 2022 when the collective West (NATO and the U.S.) promised plenty of weapons to Ukraine to win the war against the Russians? Ukraine was promised HIMARS precision guided artillery, Storm Shadow cruise missiles, Patriot anti-missile batteries, Leopard tanks from Germany, Challenger tanks from the UK, Abrams tanks and Bradley fighting vehicles from the U.S., plenty of 155mm artillery shells, drones, satellite intelligence, logistical support and much more.

Guess what? All the military equipment and more was delivered to Ukraine at a cost of over $200 billion dollars, mostly provided by the U.S. And it all failed.

Seven Patriot anti-missile batteries were destroyed by Russian hypersonic missiles at a cost of $1 billion each. The HIMARS artillery proved worthless when the Russians learned how to jam the GPS systems so that the shells landed harmlessly away from their targets. Storm Shadows and drones were shot down by Russian ground-to-air anti-missile batteries. The armor (Leopards, Challengers, Abrams and Bradleys) was blown up on the battlefield by Russian mines, drones, helicopters and aircraft. The Ukrainian artillery barrels melted down or wore out and could not be replaced. Ukraine is almost out of 155mm shells and cannot replace them because the Western arsenals are empty also and replacements cannot be made fast enough.

Meanwhile, the Russian economy is on a war footing and is producing all of the drones, fighter jets, artillery, shells, tanks and more that are needed. The Russia economy is booming even as Germany, the UK and EU as a whole are in recession.

A recent from the Kyiv Post takes a close look at the tank fiasco from the Ukrainian perspective. U.S., German and UK tanks are being blown up by Russian FPV drones and crews are running for their lives from the burning vehicles. Ukraine has taken to keeping the tanks far from the battlefield and using them as mobile artillery instead of front-line attack weapons.

The U.S. is preparing to spend another $60 billion in weapons deliveries for Ukraine. It’s not clear why. There’s nothing left to buy and none of the prior wonder weapons delivered have made the slightest difference in the outcome of the war.
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MY TAKE: Maybe it time to try to negotiate an end to this insane war with Russia instead of pumping more money into another lost war.

[ChuckGeb]

In addition to our wasted treasure and humiliating lack of a winning strategy, a generation of Ukraine’s young men have been annihilated or if lucky snuck out of the country likely never to return. Very sad situation that need not have ever happened.