Howitzers without GPS, rocket launchers with a shorter range – the US supplies Ukraine with some weapon systems only with restrictions. Are there export rules behind it or is it the fear of a reaction from Russia?
Leopard 2 main battle tanks from Norway, MiG-29 fighter jets from Slovakia: Ukraine receives almost daily deliveries of heavy weapons from the West. The US announced a new $350 million military aid package on March 20. However, the previously promised Abrams M1 main battle tanks are not yet included.
Abrams tanks without secret armor
Most recently, it was said from Washington that they wanted to shorten the delivery time and send older models by autumn. At the beginning of the year, the US magazine Politico reported that the US did not want to supply Ukraine with Abrams main battle tanks with secret armor made of depleted uranium. Export regulations were given as a reason.
Gustav Gressel, military expert at the European Council on Foreign Relations (ECFR), sees nothing unusual in this. “Ukraine will get the export variant of the Abrams, as used in Egypt, Saudi Arabia and Iraq,” Gressel told DW. Their armor is comparable to that of the older German Leopard 2 A4 main battle tanks that Norway and, before that, Poland had delivered to Ukraine. The older Abrams is “still a good main battle tank, it has a good thermal imaging scope and a powerful gun and is superior to Russian tanks in terms of handling.”
US howitzers and Ukrainian software
Export rules are one of the reasons why the US only supplies modified versions of certain weapons to Ukraine. But not the only one. “One wonders what happens if a tank is left behind and is captured and analyzed by the Russians,” says Gressel. This concern may also apply to the US M777 howitzers that have been delivered to Ukraine since April 2022. These howitzers were delivered without GPS navigation and the associated on-board computers. Weapons without GPS are generally less accurate.
The Ukrainian army quickly found a solution and installed its own systems, including artillery software GIS “Arta”, developed in Ukraine. According to Ukrainian and Western media, one of the most famous uses of M777 howitzers with GIS “Arta” software was in May 2022. At that time, Ukrainian artillery prevented a particularly large number of Russian troops from crossing the Seversky Donets River near the village of Bilohorivka in the Luhansk region. Gustav Gressel sees the Ukraine at an advantage: “With the artillery, fire orders go digitally much faster”. On the Russian side, on the other hand, “a lot is still being done with radiotelephony”.
Serhij Hrabskyj, a military expert from Kiev and a former officer in the Ukrainian army, looks calmly at the limitations of western weapon systems. “All command information systems are integrated into NATO command structures, they can only be used within the framework of NATO tasks,” Hrabskyj said in a DW interview. This is normal practice, Ukraine uses its own systems.
Short-range HIMARS missile launcher
The situation is different with the US-made HIMARS mobile rocket launchers, which Ukraine has been successfully using for precise strikes deep behind the front line since the summer of 2022. The US is supplying missiles with a range of around 80 kilometers, but not the much more powerful ATACMS missiles, which can hit targets up to 300 kilometers away.
The Wall Street Journal reported that the US modified these rocket launchers prior to delivery so that longer-range rockets could not be fired at all. Not even if Ukraine were to find them on the world market. The newspaper quotes an anonymous source in the US government as saying that the reason was the desire to “reduce the risk of a widening of the war with Moscow”. In September 2022, Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said longer-range missiles were a “red line.” That would make Washington a party to the conflict. Gustav Gressel believes that the technical restrictions on HIMARS rocket launchers can also be reversed if Washington decides to do so for political reasons.
Stephen Blank, a US expert at the Foreign Policy Research Institute and a former professor at the US Army War College, said restrictions on US arms sales to Ukraine had to do with “fear of Russia and an escalation of the war by Russia”. However, Blank thinks this concern is exaggerated. “I think we’re too afraid of an escalation by Russia,” says the expert. “I don’t understand why Russian territory should be excluded from Ukrainian strikes. Russia started this war and destroyed Ukraine.” Blank sees a “significant difference” on the battlefield in the fact that Russia can concentrate its war equipment on the border with Ukraine and “fire at will” without fearing a counterattack. “If they could no longer do it, that would be a great advantage for Ukraine.” Blank advocates showing in dealings with Russia that one “does not allow oneself to be pushed around”.
In early 2023, Ukraine’s western partners promised to supply missiles with a range of up to 150 kilometers. Defense Minister Oleksiy Reznikov said at the time that Kyiv had promised not to fire them into Russian territory. However, this does not apply to the territories occupied by Russia.
Warning of wrong signals to Putin
Stephen Blank believes the allies in Europe are even more afraid than the US. The Biden administration wants to keep NATO together and is therefore taking this into account, according to the expert. NATO has repeatedly emphasized that it is not a party to the war and does not want to be drawn into the war. ECFR’s Gustav Gressel finds this correct, but criticizes the idea in Washington that one can “micromanage the war to end it in a desired stalemate”. A war is “too complex and chaotic” for that, says Gressel. “You’re just signaling to Putin that he has some chance of winning the war by waiting it out. For him, every holdback on Western arms deliveries is a signal that we don’t mean business.”
Autor: Roman Goncharenko
