When the Biden administration presses Congress to approve a $60 billion aid package and concerns about the war’s future emerge, the meetings—which were originally intended to help the Ukrainians establish new relationships and commitments with the American defense industry to support Kyiv’s capacity to produce its own weapons—have gained more significance.
Entire 350 industry and government representatives from the United States, Ukraine, and Europe are scheduled to attend the closed-door sessions, which will include national armaments directors from all 50 countries that have united to supply Ukraine. The big names hosting the meetings are a reflection of its goals. William LaPlante, the Pentagon’s acquisition chief, will be present for their meeting.
Ukrainian
Leading Ukrainian officials, national security advisor Jake Sullivan, Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin, Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo, and other officials will preside over the first day of the conference, which has been dubbed the U.S.-Ukraine Defense Industrial Base Conference. Per a National Security Council spokesman, the second day “will focus on business-to-business networking and cooperation”.
Yermak described the Washington visit as “extremely important for our defense industry” during a speech in Kiev last month. Representatives from a number of domestic businesses, both state-owned and private, will be present at the event. The United States is home to even more businesses.
The Ukrainian government wants to rebuild its own defense sector and eventually start exporting drones and other equipment that Ukrainian engineers have been working on since the Russian invasion, rather than depending so heavily on the generosity of foreign allies.
The visit takes place as Ukrainian forces struggle to hold off entrenched Russian troops during their second bloody winter.
But this year, the atmosphere is different. It was believed that the alleged low morale of the Russians foreshadowed a stronger counterattack than what Ukraine was able to execute last winter, when optimism was high regarding the planned springtime offensives. Given months of inactive frontline fighting over hundreds of miles of farmland that has reduced the war to an artillery slugfest over yards of muddy earth, the outlook for this December is more subdued.
On November 30, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, the president of Ukraine, visits Kupiansk, a frontline city in the Kharkiv region.
Lukatsky Efrem/AP
Short-range radars and air defenses rank highest on Ukraine’s list of equipment needs from allies for the winter months in order to break the impasse and safeguard vital infrastructure from Russian drone and ballistic missile attacks.
According to a person familiar with U.S.-Ukraine discussions who was granted anonymity to discuss internal deliberations, Kyiv is specifically looking for Sentinel short-range radars, which are intended to track ballistic missiles, slower-moving drones, fixed- and rotary-wing aircraft, and a lot in between.
Additionally, Kyiv is looking for 120mm Grad air defense rockets and 155mm and 152mm ammunition. Furthermore, it wants smaller counterbattery radars to be able to pinpoint the source of Russian mortar and short-range missile fire to frontline units.
On the fringes of the Halifax International Security Forum last month, Ukrainian parliamentarian Yehor Cherniev, deputy chair of the Committee on National Security, Defence and Intelligence, stated, “We understand Russia will use missiles against us this winter but they are just waiting for the cold weather to target our gas and electric sites.”
“We don’t want fish, but we have the tools to catch the fish,” Cherniev stated, highlighting one of our main points during our meetings in Washington. While no American manufacturers have followed suit, two European defense contractors have already stated that they will start working in Ukraine. The British company BAE has also announced it is opening an office in Kyiv and may start producing 105mm guns in Ukraine. Rheinmetall, the German arms giant, has stated it would collaborate with Ukroboronprom, the state arms company of Ukraine, to build tanks and armored vehicles.
In contrast to last December, when Kyiv’s top requests were for long-range American and British missiles, F-16 fighter jets, and Abrams tanks, this time around, the strategy is different. Having just completed their surprisingly successful fall counteroffensive, which drove Russian forces from hundreds of square miles of territory in the east and south, Ukrainian leaders at that point in the conflict vowed to repeat their victory in the spring by resupplying and refurbishing over the winter.
Even after a summer of fierce fighting against well-entrenched Russian forces, columns of modern Western armor and longer-range missiles proved to be useful against a well-entrenched and fortified foe, but not powerful enough to achieve the desired result.
Kyiv is anxious to get that package passed before messy American presidential election politics intervene to slow things down, or possibly cut off aid, since the fate of $60 billion in weapons and other aid is still stuck in Congress and President Joe Biden has less than $5 billion remaining in authority to transfer more weapons and equipment from U.S. shelves.
Ukrainian leaders have changed from openly demanding the donation of significant weaponry systems in comparison to earlier meetings. Rather, they are channeling their efforts into assuring their Western allies that they are prepared for a protracted battle that they believe will be shielded from Western politics and more intimately associated with the world’s defense industry.
Find IFSC code : https://arthvarta.com/ifsc-code-find-micr-codes-address-all-bank-branches/
A recent attack exemplified this change. The Russians, who have been attempting to shut down the lights in Kyiv since the beginning of their full-scale invasion in February 2022, are the source of the attack, which involved several drones built in Ukraine targeting power generation sites in the Russian-occupied east.
The Ukrainian attack was partially successful; multiple occupied towns were able to lose power. However, the lasting message it conveyed was that Kyiv would use its newfound means to press harder against the Russian forces occupying its territory come wintertime.
Recent months have seen millions of dollars pour into Ukraine’s short- and medium-range drone programs as it saw potential for rapid return on investment. During this process, they have acquired commercial drones from all over the world to use for one-way missions and to drop small arms on Russian troops. Russia has recently joined this effort, resulting in the creation of a deadly new drone war spanning hundreds of miles of deeply entrenched front lines.
Throughout the winter, “Russia will most likely continue to attack the energy infrastructure,” according to Pavel Verkhniatskyi, managing partner of COSA Intelligence Solutions in Kyiv. “They gathered a good deal of missiles and drones and changed their tactics, but we have more air defense this time around and we’ve learned a lot from the war,” the statement reads.
The price of those lessons is high. There is some concern in Europe and Washington about how long their military support can last as defense industries struggle to boost production, as a result of holding out for so long without being able to deliver a decisive blow against occupying Russian forces. This has made the endgame of the war less clear.
According to Ukrainian lawmaker Cherniev, “we already feel the lack of these resources because the packages [from the U.S.] now become less and less, smaller and smaller.” However, this war’s intensity is not and will not decrease.
For latest update follow us on : https://twitter.com/arthvarta
