by tyler | May 18, 2023 | CNN, europe
The columns of dozens of US-supplied M-ATVs kept coming, preceded by a police car, lights blaring, and tailed by dozens of muddy, civilian saloons. Where the armored vehicles were ultimately destined for was unclear. But they were still beige – the paintjob they would have had for use in Iraq and Afghanistan – suggesting they were at least a spray can or mud-shower away from being ready for use on the front line.
Over five weeks reporting along the southern frontlines, it became hard to conceive that – at least in its limited, preparatory stages – Ukraine’s counteroffensive had not got under way in late April.
The relentless pinpoint bombing of Russian military targets; the hints of small Ukrainian landings along the occupied eastern bank of the Dnipro River; and the blasts hitting fuel depots and infrastructure inside Russia’s own borders and in occupied cities – these could all be seen as indicators.
Also, too, a helicopter attack we witnessed against a Russian target; the persistent signals from occupied officials of Ukrainian probing attacks along the Zaporizhzhia frontline; and the evacuation of the civilian population in occupied areas.
The signs have gathered in pace over the past month, and are the opening traces of the “shaping operations” that a senior US official told CNN began last week. Yet officially, Ukraine’s counteroffensive has yet to start.
Given the volume of US and NATO hardware, advice and training poured into this operation – with a senior US official recently telling Congress the US had coached Kyiv in how to “surprise” – it seems fair to assume this delay in declaring the start of the assault is a tactic, not the product of Ukrainian chaos, disorganization, and a relatively wet April leaving the ground too soft.
Announcing the start is entirely in the gift of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky. Declare the operation underway, and the clock ticks immediately for the first results. Say it has yet to get underway, and any mounting losses Russia sustains are just in the cut and thrust of normal frontline attrition. Over the past month, Zelensky’s obfuscatory comments that the operation’s “first important steps” would “happen soon,” or needed “a bit more time,” have just doubled down on Kyiv’s initial pledge they would not announce its start.
It is possible we only learn the counteroffensive has begun when its first tangible results are revealed. A lot of what is happening is not playing out in public.
The aim of this confusion is clearly to keep Moscow off-balance, unable to assess whether each new attack by Ukrainian forces is “it,” or just another probe.
The recent assaults around Bakhmut are evidence in point. The chief of the Russian mercenary group Wagner, Yevgeny Prigozhin, spent 10 days in an elaborate conversation essentially with himself on Telegram, warning of Wagner’s collapse without more artillery shells from Russian top brass. He received almost no official public response to his pleas, and it is unclear whether they altered any of the Russian Ministry of Defense’s supply patterns.
Prigozhin’s remarkable survival, after this bout of public criticism of the Kremlin’s men, is an expression of both need and fear: Putin perhaps fears the backlash Prigozhin’s removal would cause, and also needs Wagner forces to maintain their positions. He may also still need Prigozhin as a foil to a powerful military. As with so much Kremlinology, the truth is for now unknowable, but also not that consequential.
What is key is the resultant display of staggering disunity in Putin’s ranks – something unthinkable in February 2022. Prigozhin’s outburst has so far resulted only in slight territorial changes in control around the symbolic city of Bakhmut.
But it has more significantly revealed a seismic difference in how Russia and Ukraine’s war machines are functioning.
Kyiv has so far managed to keep secret its intentions, preparations, and any possible false starts. The Ukrainians appear to have patience, and the ability to keep their plan confidential enough to carry it out methodically. Moscow instead has paraded its dysfunctionality in full. This will be vital in the weeks ahead: Moscow appears to process bad news very poorly and publicly.
So far, the most information we have had about Ukraine’s operations has been from pro-Russian occupation officials and military bloggers. At times, it may be purposeful disinformation.
When Russian sources warned of Russia’s troops being surrounded in Lyman this summer, it was likely a ruse designed to distract from Moscow executing a calm withdrawal. But at other times, their online debate of policy and weaknesses projects chaos into ranks that clearly do not need it. The Russian withdrawal from Kherson was another striking example of conflicting messages from senior officials.
Yet still, as with the turmoil around Wagner and Bakhmut, the disorder of their messaging around it cannot always be rationally explained as a purposeful fog of misinformation. Nobody wants to look that messy when frontline morale is surely so low.
In the weeks ahead, we will likely see more confusion about what Ukraine is up to. Strikes against specific and important Russian targets, deeper inside occupied territory, may pick up in pace and ferocity, as with the apparent missile strikes on large buildings inside Luhansk.
We may also see more apparent false Ukrainian starts along a 1,000-kilometer (620-mile) frontline. In the West, Ukraine must make occupied Kherson continue to appear vulnerable to a larger amphibious assault across the Dnipro River; and in the east, Bakhmut must still seem precariously at risk of its city being surrounded by renewed Ukrainian advances. And between these two flanks, the huge southern front of Russian-occupied Zaporizhzhia must also remain vulnerable to a swift advance through Russian fortifications by a better-equipped and more precise NATO-trained army.
Moscow cannot afford to lose on any of these three fronts. Yet it may be forced to choose – to prioritize – and with that choice will come the first risk of a wider strategic defeat for Putin.
Lose any one of these “prizes” of occupation and the entire project looks even flimsier than it did when the Kremlin had to admit, for whatever reason, it had been attacked by drones in the heart of Moscow. One public, strategic loss could leave Russian ranks at risk of a wholesale panic and collapse.
Zelensky’s most telling comments on the operation were perhaps his renewed and blatant plea for more Western arms: he said victory was assured but without better equipment faster, more Ukrainian lives would be lost. This is a key tenet so far of Kyiv’s campaign: the sanctity of Ukrainian life. Their losses are doubtless significant, but they are wildly less accepting of them than their enemy.
A full-frontal assault against weakened Russians positions – where supply chains, command and morale is likely weak – is possible by Kyiv at any time. But weeks more of Russian confusion, overstretch, and public self-criticism will likely reduce the ultimate human cost on Kyiv.
While Moscow’s mixed messages perhaps herald rare signs of internal fissures, Kyiv’s are a sign of purpose and resolve.
by tyler | May 18, 2023 | CNN, europe
Spain’s equality ministry says it will launch an app designed to monitor the sharing of chores between members of a household, as part of a drive to improve gender equality.
Angela Rodríguez, second-in-command in Spain’s ministry of equality, announced the plans at a meeting of the United Nations’ Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women in Geneva on Tuesday.
“What surveys tell us is that women spend a lot more time on household chores than men do,” said Rodríguez, who added that the app will allow each member of the household to input the time they spend on chores.
“It’s a very simple thing,” she said, explaining that the app will work in a similar way to apps like Splitwise, which allow groups to share the cost of meals or other spending.
According to a survey from Spain’s national statistics institute, published in December, 45.9% of female respondents said they carried out the majority of household chores, compared to just 14.9% of men.
Rodríguez emphasized that all sorts of different tasks should be considered household chores.
For example, washing the dishes is an obvious task to put into the app, but before that someone has to shop for ingredients, plan what needs to be eaten on that particular day and then cook the meal, she said.
“All of these tasks, this mental load, fall almost always on women, that’s what the surveys say,” said Rodríguez.
The app, which should be available by summer, will be useful not only for couples, but for households comprising parents and children or housemates, she added.
Rodríguez also commented on the plans on Twitter.
“All of those who are offended by the household chores app are really offended by the possibility that they will have to start doing their bit at home,” she wrote.
It forms part of a wider “co-responsibility” plan from the left-wing government of Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez, who came to power in 2018 promising to focus on gender issues.
“This new government is unequivocally committed to equality. You have heard me say it many times: Spain changed on March 8,” he said in 2018, before naming a groundbreaking female-majority cabinet.
by tyler | May 17, 2023 | CNN, europe
A crucial deal aimed at averting a global food crisis following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has been extended for two months.
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said Wednesday an agreement has been reached with Russia and Ukraine to extend the Black Sea grain deal.
Ukraine is one of the world’s leading grain exporters but after the war began, Russia blockaded Ukrainian ports, sparking fears of a global famine.
Since last summer, an agreement between the two sides has enabled the safe passage of ships from Ukraine. It is the first and only major pact to be made between the warring sides since the outbreak of the war.
The deal has now been resuscitated for a third time after a question mark hung over its survival. Here’s what you need to know.
The Black Sea grain deal was first reached in July 2022.
Russia had been blockading vital grain exports from key Ukrainian Black Sea ports, including Odesa, Chornomorsk, and Pivdennyi. US intelligence also indicated that Russian forces were deploying mines in the Black Sea.
The blockages meant that millions of tons of Ukrainian grain were not being exported to the many countries that rely on it.
The impact of the war on global food markets was immediate and extremely painful, especially because Ukraine is a major supplier of grain to the World Food Programme (WFP). According to the European Commission, Ukraine accounts for 10% of the world wheat market, 15% of the corn market, and 13% of the barley market. It is also a key global player in the market of sunflower oil.
The Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), an UN body, warned at the time that as many as 47 million people could be pushed into “acute food insecurity” because of the war. Western officials accused Russia of using food as a weapon.
The deal – brokered by the United Nations and Turkey with Russia and Ukraine – created procedures to ensure the safe export of grain from Ukrainian ports.
As part of the deal, grain ships were able to navigate through a safe corridor in the Black Sea under the direction of Ukrainian pilots, and then pass through the Bosphorus Strait – an important shipping corridor in north-west Turkey – in order to reach global markets.
The agreement has proven vital for stabilizing global food prices and bringing relief to the developing countries who rely on Ukrainian exports.
Since being struck the deal has enabled an estimated 900 ships to safely leave Black Sea ports, delivering 24 million tons of grain to countries as far afield as Africa and the Middle East.
The Black Sea grain deal was an agreement made between Russia and Ukraine – however, it was not a direct agreement. During its signing in Istanbul, representatives from Russia and Ukraine did not sit together during the ceremony, the Washington Post reported at the time.
NATO-member Turkey, who has positioned itself as an intermediary between Kyiv and Moscow since the beginning of the conflict, brokered the rare deal with the United Nations.
As part of its role in the pact, Turkey carries out inspections on all the merchant vessels that pass through the Black Sea in specially established safe corridors.
Another key creation of the deal is the Joint Coordination Center (JCC), which was set up in Istanbul under the auspices of the UN.
The JCC comprises 20 officials – five representatives each from Russia, Ukraine, the UN and Turkey – and is tasked with monitoring the movement of the vessels and ensuring that all sides are complying with the Initiative.
The deal’s survival rests in Russia’s hands. Prior to its third renewal, the Kremlin had remained elusive as to whether it would remain in the pact.
The deal was initially brokered for a period of 120 days and was set to expire in November last year.
Russia suspended its participation for a few days in late October and early November last year, citing drone attacks on the city of Sevastopol in occupied Crimea. Moscow later announced that it would reverse course and rejoin the agreement for a further 120 days, following mediation.
The deal was renewed in March for another 60 days and is due to expire again on Thursday, May 18.
Prior to Wednesday’s announcement, it remained unclear whether the agreement would be renewed for a third time after two days of urgent talks in Istanbul earlier this month failed to reach a decisive outcome.
Russia had once again threatened to quit the deal and cited a list of demands, largely over exports of its own food stuffs and fertilizers.
Moscow repeatedly complained that a separate agreement with the UN to facilitate shipments of Russian fertilizers and grain, which was brokered as part of the package last July, had not yielded results.
The Kremlin has also warned it would scrap the deal if the Group of Seven (G7) nations imposed further bans on exports to Russia as part of sanctions over its invasion of Ukraine. Bloomberg reported last month that G7 officials are considering whether to impose an outright ban on almost all exports to Russia, placing further economic pressure on the country.
Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Vershinin warned after the talks in Istanbul that if there was no consensus by May 18, the deal would “cease to exist.”
On Wednesday, on the brink of its expiry, Erdogan confirmed the deal would be extended for a further two months. This was followed by confirmation from Ukrainian and Russian officials.
Oleksandr Kubrakov, the Ukrainian minister of communities, territories and infrastructure development, said on Facebook: “The grain deal has been unblocked and will continue to be in effect until July 18. The world will continue to receive Ukrainian products thanks to the efforts of our partners in the agreement – Turkey and the UN.
“We are grateful to our partners for their unwavering and focused position that the agreement should continue to work and on the terms signed by all parties.”
However, Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova warned: “Distortions in the implementation of the grain deal should be corrected as quickly as possible.”
Not quite. Following Russia’s blockade, the European Union lifted all duties on grain from Ukraine via land, to facilitate exports.
This, though, caused a glut of cheap Ukrainian grain to flow into central and eastern Europe, hitting the sales of local producers.
Demonstrators last month blocked traffic and border checkpoints with tractors along the border between Romania and Bulgaria, in an effort to prevent Ukrainian trucks from entering their country.
These visible signs of discontent were significant in a region of the world that has been consistently supportive of Ukraine in the face of Russian aggression. As BulgarianAgriculture Minister Yavor Gechev said: “Bulgaria is in solidarity with Ukraine, but a local glut is being created on the agricultural market, because instead of export corridors our countries are becoming warehouses.”
To quell the unrest, the EU subsequently adopted a temporary measure that bans wheat, maize, rapeseed and sunflower seed originating in Ukraine from being exported to Bulgaria, Hungary, Poland, Romania and Slovakia.
This move, however, was criticized by Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, who slammed the “protectionist measures” as “completely unacceptable.”
by tyler | May 17, 2023 | CNN, europe
At least eight people have been killed by heavy flooding and mudslides in the northern Italian region of Emilia Romagna, with more than 5,000 residents being forced to evacuate, according to local authorities.
The bodies have been retrieved from various locations, the vice president of Emilia Romagna, Irene Priolo, told reporters according to Reuters, adding that the rains were easing but that river levels were still rising.
The region, which has been suffering a prolonged drought, is under a red alert – the highest level warning or state of emergency for life-threatening weather events. The Emilia Romagna Grand Prix, scheduled for this weekend, has been canceled and the site evacuated.
Fourteen rivers burst their banks in the region, forcing people in cities such as Cesena to climb onto the roof of their buildings to escape incoming water, Reuters reported. Firefighters rescued them with helicopters or rubber dinghies.
A total of 600 firefighters have been deployed from across Italy to assist with evacuations in the region after Italy’s longest river, the Po, broke its banks,” the Italian Department for Civil Protection said in a tweet.
Residents in numerous areas across the region, including in the city of Bologna, were asked not to leave their homes.
The city of Ravenna has also been heavily affected. “It’s probably been the worst night in the history of Romagna,” Ravenna Mayor Michele de Pascale told RAI public radio according to Reuters, saying that 5,000 people had been evacuated from his city alone overnight.
“Ravenna is unrecognizable for the damage it has suffered,” he added.
Tweeting on Tuesday evening, Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni extended her “total sympathy” to those affected by the flooding, adding that the government stands “ready to intervene with the necessary aid.”
This pledge was echoed by Deputy Prime Minister Antonio Tajani in a tweet Wednesday morning, saying that the “government will do everything necessary to help” everyone from “evacuees to those who have lost crops” due to the flooding.
In the neighboring eastern region of Le Marche, also severely hit by flooding, 200 firefighters have been mobilized for rescue efforts in the past 24 hours, according to the Vigili del Fuoco fire service.
The torrential rains come after months of drought that dried out the land – which meteorologists say has reduced its capacity to absorb water, worsening the floods, according to Reuters.
Water levels on northern Italy’s Lake Garda fell to record lows in February, with Venice experiencing unusually low tides.
From lengthy droughts to severe flooding, the intensity of water-related disasters around the world has increased over the last two decades as global temperatures climbed to record levels, according to recent research.
The study from NASA scientists published in March in the journal Nature Water found that increasingly frequent, widespread and intense droughts and floods were linked more strongly to higher global temperatures than to naturally changing weather patterns, like El Niño and La Niña. This suggests these intense events will increase as the climate crisis accelerates, the study says.
Formula 1 has announced the cancellation of this weekend’s Emilia Romagna Grand Prix because of heavy flooding in the region, citing safety concerns.
In a statement shared on Twitter, it said, “It would not be right to put further pressure on the local authorities and emergency services at this difficult time.”
On Tuesday, Formula 1 staff were asked to leave the site of the race as a precautionary measure, an F1 source told CNN.
The Emilia Romagna Grand Prix is the first event of the Formula 1 season in Europe and was scheduled to take place this weekend.
by tyler | May 17, 2023 | CNN, europe
Italy, a country once known for its big families gathered around the dinner table, is facing a crisis of unparalleled proportions.
For the first time, the number of births in a year fell below 400,000 – representing an average of 1.25 babies per woman, according to official figures for 2022.
This means that the replacement rate is now negative, since the number of deaths currently exceeds the number of births – 12 deaths for every seven births.
Italy is the world’s 8th largest economy and has a population of just under 60 million. In 2022, the southern European country registered just 393,000 babies, according to the Italian National Institute of Statistics (ISTAT), the lowest since records began in 1861.
Babies born in Italy to unregistered migrants and to some same-sex and heterosexual Italian couples who used surrogacy abroad are not automatically part of the official record, according to Italy’s national birth registrar.
And if the trend does not reverse itself, the country could face an economic “dark age,” as there will be a decline in the number of people entering the workforce even as more people retire.
“In our pension system, which is a pay-as-you-go system, where the current workers pay for the pension benefits of the current retired people, this will create a big challenge and burden,” Maria Rita Testa, a professor of demography at Luiss University in Rome, told CNN.
“The projections by the government show that the peak in terms of pension spending will be reached in 2044,” Testa said, to meet the needs of the large baby boomer generation.
By 2030, Italy can expect 2 million workers to have entered retirement with no corresponding new members of the workforce to pay their pensions, according to Testa.
The birth rate in Italy has been declining steadily since the economic crisis in 2008, for reasons demographers agree is rooted in economic insecurity. The average monthly income across Italy is €2,475 a month, according to ISTAT. But the average rental property is €12.12 ($13.16) per square meter, meaning a 100 square meter family apartment costs €1,212 ($1,316) – roughly half the monthly budget.
Italy also used to be a country of savers, with the average Italian saving 20% of annual income, according to ISTAT figures, in part because many families live in multi-generational homes or homes bought by their parents. But when the COVID-19 pandemic hit and Italy locked down, the annual savings rate dropped to just over 11% by July 2020, and dropped further, to just over 5% of annual income, as of January 2023, according to the World Bank and ISTAT.
For couples of child-bearing age, many of whom are just entering the workforce, that translates to hesitancy when it comes to starting a family. “For those who have to decide to make the transition to parenthood, to become parents, the big problem is to find a solid job [and] economic independence to allow them to get the credit to buy a house and to start building a family,” Testa said.
In order to spur a baby boom, the Italian government has been toying with incentives, starting with the government of Mario Draghi, which in May 2021 introduced monthly payments of up to €175 ($190) per child, a policy which has been continued by the government of Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni. Draghi’s plan included pumping $25.4 million into the economy to boost childcare and hire more women and young people.
But other countries, including Germany and France, do far more for potential parents, although that doesn’t always translate to higher birth rates. In Germany, where new parents can take up to three years of partially paid or unpaid maternity leave, the birth rate is just slightly higher than Italy, at an average of 1.4 babies per woman for the first half of 2022.
In France, the birth rate is higher at 1.8 children per woman, according to figures for 2022 from its national statistics agency.
The situation in Italy is unique for two reasons. The Catholic Church, which is a predominant political force, and the right-wing government under Meloni have both lamented the low birth rate, but have put up roadblocks to ways to remedy the situation.
Meloni’s government has promoted the traditional family, criticized assisted reproduction like surrogacy for both heterosexual and gay couples, and rejected the idea of offering birth right to immigrants, even to those born of permanent, tax-paying residents.
“I want a country where it’s not scandalous to say we are still born from a man and a woman and where it’s not a taboo to say that maternity is not for sale or that we don’t rent uteruses,” Meloni said last week at a conference to address the dwindling birth rate.
Pope Francis, who also attended the conference, said that a lack of births meant a lack of hope, and hinted at the idea that “acceptance and inclusion” beyond Italian borders could help populate the country.
Italy is undergoing an unprecedented surge in irregular migration, with 45,510 people arriving in Italy by sea between January 1 and May 16 this year.
None of those arriving are guaranteed asylum or protection unless they undergo a lengthy asylum process. And none of the babies born during that process will be counted in Italy’s demographic statistics or integrated into Italian society, because they are now kept in migrant camps after Italy declared a state of emergency last month.
Francesco Lollobrigida, Meloni’s brother-in-law and the country’s minister of agriculture, raised eyebrows last month when he suggested that Italians “were at risk of ethnic replacement” if migration wasn’t put in check. “That’s not the way forward,” he said.
Claudia Giagheddu Saitta, 27, and Gabriele De Luca, 31, are concerned about raising a family with so many uncertainties. Tax cuts on baby products and birth incentives aren’t enough, they say.
“The government thinks €10,000 ($10,800) is enough to have a child. But the incentives are temporary. A child lasts forever,” Giagheddu Saitta says. She says the idea of having more than one child, if she has one at all, feels impossible.
De Luca blames the government for not doing enough for the younger generation, in part because decades of low birth rates have made the youth a minority. He says that because governments are voted in by people in their 50s, 60s and 70s, their interests come first. “The government has to take risks. They have to take unpopular decisions if they really want to stimulate growth. They have to represent the side of the youth.”
Less than one quarter of women born in 1980, who are now 43, have children, according to the national birth registrar. Some want children, but can’t afford them, and others are choosing to remain childless.
Italian mothers are the oldest in Europe and, according to a number of professionals CNN spoke to, it is because they feel they need to reach a certain level of financial and a work stability before they’re comfortable starting a family, which is usually in their 30s.
Testa fears that the low birth rate is contagious. It used to be that foreigners living in Italy had far more children than Italian women, but now they are adapting to the economic climate and aligning with the Italian birth rate.
“The low fertility trap says if women and men get used to small family size it might become the ideal, the reference model,” she says. “And if it is a reference model, the one child family, the fertility (rate) will even go lower and create a downward spiral of low fertility.”
by tyler | May 17, 2023 | CNN, europe
It’s the big question that has Russian military commanders scratching their heads: What’s made Ukraine’s air defenses so impenetrable all of a sudden?
This month alone, Russia has launched eight waves of missile attacks on the Ukrainian capital, the latest of them a bombardment in the early hours of Tuesday that involved at least 18 missiles of various types and a swarm of drones.
Yet Kyiv claims to have escaped with barely a scratch, denying any of the missiles or drones hit their targets.
That may be an overstatement – US officials believe a US-made Patriot defense system was likely damaged – but even allowing for hyperbole, experts say it’s clear something remarkable is going on.
Until recently most analysts and even US defense officials simply doubted Ukraine’s air defenses would be up to the job of repelling a sustained Russian assault.
Just last month, leaked US government documents detailed how Ukrainian stocks of Soviet-era medium-range air defense missiles were severely depleted, while even Alexander Rodnyansky, an economic adviser to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenksy, has recently admitted to CNN that his country’s air defenses were “not coping well enough.”
Those assessments followed a March 9 onslaught in which Russia launched 84 missiles at major cities across Ukraine. On that occasion, even Kyiv admits six Kinzhal ballistic missiles managed to elude its air defenses.
So what’s changed in the space of just a few weeks?
The obvious answer, in the Kyiv region at least, is the deployment of the US-made Patriot air defense systems, which arrived in Ukraine last month.
The US and Germany have each supplied one Patriot battery to Ukraine.
Patriot interceptor missiles can hit high- and medium-altitude aircraft, cruise missiles and some ballistic missiles, according to the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS).
So formidable are the Patriot defenses that Russia has pledged to take them out. Indeed, some experts believe this month’s wave of attacks has been designed specifically to overwhelm them with numbers.
And Tuesday’s attacks on Kyiv likely damaged, but did not destroy, one of Ukraine’s Patriot systems, a US official told CNN.
But it’s not the Patriots alone defending Ukraine’s skies.
Kyiv has received more short- and medium-range air defense missiles from other NATO countries, according to the CSIS.
These include some of the most-advanced systems available, like the German IRIS-T batteries, and less-advanced ones, like the Hawk anti-missile system, the predecessor of the Patriot.
“Ukrainian leaders have stated that the IRIS-T system has succeeded in 90 percent of engagements,” Ian Wiliams of the Missile Defense Project at CSIS wrote in a report this month, adding that another Western donation, US NASAMS, had a 100% success rate, according to comments last November by US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin.
Then there are the weapons Ukraine already possessed before the war broke out, mostly Soviet-era systems that include the S-300 and Buk M1 medium-range anti-air missiles. Those systems have had about an 80% success rate hitting Russian cruise missiles, the CSIS report says.
But Kyiv is fast running out of ammunition for its Soviet-era systems, according to the leaked US documents and the CSIS report.
“With a limited number of missiles remaining, Ukrainians will need to hold them for the highest priority targets – Russian aircraft or missiles heading for the most sensitive targets,” the CSIS report says.
Some wonder whether exhausting Ukraine anti-air missile stocks is the whole point of the current onslaught.
On Tuesday, Russia unleashed a barrage from several quarters: Kinzhal ballistic missiles launched from fighter jets, Kalibr cruise missiles fired from the Black Sea, and Iskander missiles fired from land, the head of Ukraine’s military said. The attack came from the north, south and east.
Videos from Kyiv showed missile trails across the night sky.
At the current rate of ammunition use – on both sides – the war could come down to who runs short in the air war first, some analysts believe.
“The high volume of air defense activity has no doubt strained the capacity of Ukrainian air defenses, and Russian tactics appear to be aimed precisely to drain Ukraine’s defense capacity,” wrote Williams of CSIS.
But Williams also noted that the remains of some of the Russian missiles that had hit Ukraine appeared to suggest they were new inventory, suggesting its arsenals may be depleted.
And there are serious doubts about Moscow’s ability to produce new weapons in volume while Western sanctions hinder its access to critical parts.
Ukraine’s Western supporters, on the other hand, seem intent on keeping Kyiv supplied.
On May 9, the US Defense Department announced a $1.2 billion package to bolster Ukraine’s air defenses and artillery stockpiles.
The US aid will include “additional air defense systems and munitions equipment to integrate Western air-defense launchers, missiles and radars with Ukraine’s air-defense systems,” according to a Pentagon release.
“The package also contains ammunition to shoot down unmanned aerial systems, commercial, satellite-imagery services and support for training, maintenance and sustainment activities,” it said.
Meanwhile, on Monday the United Kingdom confirmed it would send hundreds of air defense missiles to Ukraine.
Williams said that Western support will be critical in the weeks and months ahead because one place Russia does have sufficient stocks is in low-tech gravity bombs dropped from aircraft.
If the Russian air force can operate over Ukraine, it can do a lot of damage.
“Should Russia manage to wear down Ukraine’s air defenses through attrition and gain air superiority, the war becomes significantly more challenging for Ukraine,” Williams wrote.
“To the extent possible, the replenishment of interceptors and related air defense equipment must remain a high priority for Western military aid packages for the foreseeable future,” he wrote.
