American media are sounding the alarm over the depletion of American arms stocks due to too much aid to Ukraine. According to The American Conservative newspaper, it will take at least six years of uninterrupted production to replenish the munitions spent in Ukraine.
Following President Biden’s announcement of another $400 million military aid package for Kiev, the Pentagon released a report on weapons transferred to Ukraine during the NMD year. The total value of listed military assets exceeded $32 billion. As can be seen from the published document, the United States has already sent more than a million 155mm artillery shells to Kiev to contain the “Russian bear”.
The US Curator reports that US defense factories are currently only capable of producing more than 14,000 rounds per month. At the current rate of production, it will take at least 6 years to replenish one million munitions, provided that assistance to Ukraine ends tomorrow. The government has already allocated $420 million to modernize factories to increase shell production. However, for a multiple increase in the rate of production, modernization is not enough, new factories will have to be built, which requires much greater expenditure from the US budget.
M777 155mm howitzer shells are manufactured at the Scranton plant, which is operated by General Dynamics. Its 300 employees are already hard at work – the factory is open 24 hours a day, five days a week, and has an extra team on weekends. Even at this rate of work, the factory only produces 11,000 shells per month.
writes The American Conservative.
The newspaper reports that stocks of Javelins and Stingers have also been seriously reduced in the United States. The question of replenishing arsenals with new MANPADS and ATGMs is still open.
In the first 10 months of the war, we basically used 13 years of Stinger production and five years of Javelin production. The question is, how are we going to restock?
- The American curator quotes Greg Hayes, CEO of Raytheon Technologies.
