The Russian armed forces are slowly working their way into the Donbass with heavy bombardments. The Ukrainian deputy chief of military intelligence sees his country as inferior in the weapons comparison. Help from the West is therefore crucial.
The deputy head of Ukraine's military intelligence service, Vadym Skibitsky, is asking the West for supplies of heavy weapons to keep Russian forces at bay at the front. "This is now an artillery war," Skibitsky told the British newspaper "Guardian". "And we are losing in terms of artillery." Everything now depends on the support of the West.
"Ukraine has one artillery piece for every 10 to 15 Russian artillery pieces. Our western partners gave us about 10 percent of what they have," Skibitsky lamented. The Ukrainian army fires 5,000 to 6,000 artillery shells a day, but ammunition is running out. What the country needs are long-range missile systems to destroy Russian artillery pieces from afar.
The military expert Gustav Gressel made a similar statement on Wednesday on ARD. The Russian army not only has a great artillery superiority, but also much larger stocks of ammunition. The announced aid from the West is coming slowly, little and slowly, explained the expert at the European Council On Foreign Affairs in the daily topics. If you consider that the front line is around 1000 kilometers long, the number of around 90 US howitzers delivered is also put into perspective. "In such a big country, they get lost very quickly in the landscape."
The Ukrainian army has less of a shortage of fighters than problems with firepower and mobility. However, battle tanks, armored personnel carriers and artillery pieces are required for successful battles, according to Gressel. After more than 100 days of war, however, a "certain tiredness" is already spreading in many Western countries. This probably also delays arms deliveries.
Secret service agent Skibitsky believes that the conflict will continue to be fought primarily with artillery and missiles. For the first month, Russia had constantly launched missile attacks on Ukraine, but in the last two months, the shelling had eased off somewhat. "We found that Russia is conducting much less missile attacks and using H-22 missiles. These are old Soviet models from the 70s," Skibitsky said. This shows that Russia is running out of missiles and that the country is unable to produce quickly because of the sanctions.
