It so happened that the history of mankind is the history of wars, and in every war there are winners and losers. The course of hostilities, and as a result, their finale, is influenced by many different factors, one of the key of which is the availability of the necessary resources. The war in Ukraine is not an exception to the rules in this aspect, its further course will largely determine the quantity and quality of weapons.
Historical context
As an inheritance from the Soviet Union, Ukraine took over a large number of weapons and an army of almost a million. Equipment, weapons and ammunition were stored in warehouses of the Ministry of Defense on a gigantic scale and required constant funding for their maintenance. However, at the beginning of the zeros, what is called a “big sale” among the military began. Everything was sold – from ammunition to African countries to fighter jets for scrap metal. Enterprising generals “wrote off” equipment in order to make money from it. The Zero Force was a large fair where everything that could be sold was sold.
Subsequently, the vector from “Reducing the number of the army” moved to the plane of “adaptation to NATO armies”. In fact, disarmament and downsizing continued under the guise of changing the outdated material base to the newest, however, almost nothing was bought or manufactured. The society will never know the exact figures of the equipment sold and cut into scrap metal, but the scale can be understood by the fact that, for example, shells in storage bases were not calculated by boxes or tons, but, attention, by wagon platforms.
One of the iconic faces of the disarmament of the Ukrainian army was ex-Minister of Defense Anatoly Hrytsenko, who in 2007 complained to journalists that the Cabinet of Ministers had not signed a single document on the disposal of shells in 8 months. Yes, even before the beginning of the military conflict in Donbas, our government was creating a foundation for future problems. And we are not yet taking into account the explosions at warehouses with weapons and ammunition, of which there were as many as fourteen between 1991 and 2019. One should, for example, recall Balaklia in the Kharkiv region. What is characteristic is that no one knows the number of destroyed and damaged ammunition, even approximately. It is not known what was the real cause of these explosions – sabotage by the Russians or the negligence of the Ukrainians.
Production? No, they haven’t heard!
Sales and explosions in warehouses would not be so painful now if there was a constant renewal of lost weapons, and for this there are two ways – purchase or manufacture. The first – happened very sluggishly, and the second did not happen at all until 2022. Ukraine has never had a plant for the production of projectiles, even during the times of the USSR. However, we had two plants at our disposal, which, if there was political will, could help in this matter. The first is a gunpowder plant in the city of Shostka, Sumy Oblast. In addition to the production of household and technical chemicals, the plant’s facilities also produced smoke powder and, most importantly, detonators for artillery shells and sub-caliber ammunition for tanks. As of 2022, the plant was unprofitable and, in fact, bankrupt. After the Russian offensive on Sumy Oblast, the fate of the plant remains unknown to the general public.
The second enterprise is even more interesting and dramatic – the “Zorya” plant in Rubizhny is currently under occupation by Russian troops. However, they are unlikely to be able to use at least some of the equipment – in May 2022, the plant was hit by a missile, as a result of which the explosives that were still in the warehouses detonated. (I watched this explosion with my own eyes, and it was remarkably similar to the nuclear mushroom from the movies).
As you already understood, the “Zorya” plant produced explosives, or more precisely, TNT, the most common explosive substance for military purposes. It is also interesting that before the war “Zorya” belonged to the odious Ukrainian politician, who is accused of working for Russia, Yury Boyka. After analyzing the situation with the production of projectiles and their components, it becomes clear why the scales of this war are not on our side.
Actual situation
Based on the amount of ammunition and military equipment left in our warehouses, we can roughly imagine the situation with this in the Russian Federation. It cannot be said that the Russian Federation did not sell anywhere or anything, because it did sell, and incomparably more than Ukraine, but they always had a practice of shifting with fresh products. Unlike Ukraine, the Russian Federation inherited projectile factories and a large number of enterprises that manufacture components for them. And also – Russia is engaged in active import of finished ammunition. Despite the sanctions, India, China, Turkey, Uzbekistan and Kazakhstan supply the Russian Federation with chemical components for the manufacture of explosives. As we can see, our opponents were able to adapt to the new world conditions and learned to act extremely effectively even under external pressure. Ukraine must also adapt.
As of today, the advantage of the Russian army is at the level of 4 to 1, and the Russian military industrial complex exceeds the capabilities of Western countries by almost four times. This is explained by the fact that factories in the West simply do not have time to produce the required amount of ammunition. According to rough estimates, this year Russia will produce 3 million shells, and all European countries together will produce 1.4 million, of which only a part will go to Ukraine. In addition, according to CNN, at the beginning of this spring, the Russians fired 10,000 shells per day, while the Ukrainians only fired 2,000.
According to the Central Intelligence Agency, in 2023 Russia produced 2 million artillery shells, and in 2024 it plans to reach the level of 2.7 million. According to more pessimistic estimates of CNN sources, the Russians will produce 3 million ammunition this year.
The production capacity of the 27 EU member states in 2023 amounted to only 0.4-0.7 million shells. According to the relevant European Commissioner Thierry Breton, in 2024 the unit will reach a capacity of 1.4 million per year. In March, the European Commission invested an additional 500 million euros in the military industry, expecting to increase this figure to 1.7 million. However, not all ammunition produced in the EU will be delivered to Ukraine, some of it will be exported or replenish European stocks.
Note that the main opponent of the Russian Federation in geopolitical processes – the United States of America – produces only 0.4 million shells per year. Despite the fact that production is constantly increasing and new enterprises are being created, it is unlikely to achieve parity in this aspect. Moreover, if the war drags on until 2025, the situation with projectiles may worsen many times, because while our allies are building and modernizing factories, the Russians are only increasing their already great advantage.
The increase in the production of ammunition in Western countries led to a shock state of the entire economy – plants and factories were completely unprepared for such a scenario of events. The most acute problem is the shortage of gunpowder for projectile charges. For example, in Ukraine, the authorities have somewhat simplified the mechanisms for growing cotton, which is used in the production of gunpowder. In Europe, everything is a little more complicated – their military-industrial complex is still dependent on the import of certain components from China in terms of projectile production.
Another important aspect of the issue of ammunition is their caliber compatibility. The armed forces of the Armed Forces of Ukraine are armed with a large number of various guns and self-propelled guns, ranging from the Soviet D-30 to the French CAESAR. Accordingly, cannon shells must be sought where the cannon is manufactured. If everything is clear with Western weapons, the situation is radically different with Soviet models. The stocks that were at the disposal of Ukraine’s allied countries are constantly running out, and there is nowhere to replenish them, trivially.
The President of the Czech Republic, Peter Pavel, took the initiative and found a million Soviet-style projectiles for Ukraine, and very soon they will appear on the battlefield. And what will happen later? It may happen that the Armed Forces will have hundreds of guns that will be inactive. Ukroboronprom undertook to solve this problem. According to official sources, Ukraine will produce a million projectiles of Soviet caliber by the end of 2024, however, the figure is most likely greatly overestimated.
The next question is quality. Armed forces gunners are skeptical of domestic shells, because the first batches proved to be too unreliable – up to 40% “failures”, while in Soviet times the figure was 10-15%. One of the ways that Ukraine can go is the creation of projectiles together with an allied state, which reduces the risks of an attack on enterprises and, accordingly, the destruction of infrastructure.
“A projectile is cheaper than a person”
During the creation of the material, I asked the officer of one of the artillery brigades of the ZSU – Andriy, for a comment, who noted:
“We need shells for yesterday. There are always not enough of them! Always! And this lack then turns into obituaries on social networks. If there were enough shells, we would have “taken apart” the Russian attack aircraft on the approach to our position, and we would have taken apart their artillery. Imagine how many lives could be saved if we had the necessary amount of weapons. A projectile is cheaper than a person! Our gunners are much more professional than in the Russian Federation, but professionalism alone will not get you far. We desperately need shells! This is a matter of life and death!”.
In general, the situation with ammunition is not in our favor, and therefore needs an immediate solution. It is the advantage in the number of artillery systems and shells that can become decisive in the positional phase of the war, and therefore affect its final outcome.
Pavlo Groholskyi
