WASHINGTON (Dispatches) – The United States and NATO countries have started to speedily restock their own arsenals after efforts to supply Ukraine with arms and ammunition to fight Russia exhausted their own stocks.
The New York Times reported on Saturday that after nine months passing since the Ukraine war kicked off, the West’s fundamental unpreparedness for the conflict has posed a dilemma, whether to supply Ukraine with the weapons it demands or to replenish the US and NATO’s emptied stockpiles.
U.S.-led NATO officials complain that the amount of resources used in the Ukraine conflict is dumbfounded.
To gain scope, during the war in Afghanistan NATO forces might have fired even 300 artillery rounds a day and had no real worries about air defense. However, Ukraine can fire thousands of rounds daily while remaining hopeless for air defense against missiles and drones.
“A day in Ukraine is a month or more in Afghanistan,” said Camille Grand, a defense expert at the European Council on Foreign Relations, who until recently was NATO’s assistant secretary general for defense investment.
According to the NYT report, both sides of the conflict with burning through arms and ammunition at a pace not seen since World War II.
In the meantime, the suppliers, namely the U.S. and NATO countries, say supplying Ukraine with the unending demands of Kiev emptied their arsenals.
The NYT noted that the challenge of keeping arsenals running has become a focal point that could prove decisive in Ukraine’s war.
Meanwhile, in another development related to the war, Russia’s president says Ukraine uses its forces as “cannon fodder” amid Moscow’s ongoing military operation in the ex-Soviet republic, saying those who refuse to fight for Kiev face dire consequences.
Vladimir Putin leveled the accusation against, what he called, Kiev’s “neo-Nazi regime”, while addressing mothers of Russian servicemen, Russia Today reported.
Russia started the military campaign in its southern neighbor in February. It says it launched the operation in order to defend the pro-Russian population in the eastern Ukrainian regions of Luhansk and Donetsk against persecution by Kiev.
Back in 2014, the two republics broke away from Ukraine, refusing to recognize a Western-backed Ukrainian government there that had overthrown a democratically-elected Russia-friendly administration.
Ever since the beginning of the war, Kiev’s allies, led by the United States and Britain, have been pumping Ukraine full of advanced weapons, a step that Russia says would only prolong the hostilities.
UN human rights high commissioner has revealed that video images showing the execution of Russian soldiers who had surrendered appear to be “highly likely authentic” and called for a thorough investigation.
After a preliminary investigation, experts from the UN human rights office confirmed the authenticity of the circulating viral footage of the execution of Russian prisoners of war who surrendered to the Ukrainian army in the village of Makiivka.
“It is highly likely that (the images) are authentic in what they show. The real circumstances of the entire sequence of events must be investigated in the most extensive way possible,” Volker Turk said on Friday.
“It is essential that all allegations of summary executions are investigated fully in a manner that is — and is seen to be — independent, impartial, thorough, transparent, prompt and effective,” the UN human rights chief added.
Turk called on the parties to issue clear instructions to their forces that there should be no retaliation made against those taken prisoners.