Russo-Ukrainian War. Day 334: Will Germany supply Leopard tanks to Ukraine?

1. On the war. 

The Institute for the Study of War has made the following assessment as of  January 22, 2023:

NSDC Secretary: Russia preparing for offensive, active information measures as its first signs, Ukrinform reports. “Russia is preparing to launch the new offensive, and active information measures intended to intimidate civilians are its first signs. The relevant statement was made by Ukrainian National Security and Defense Council (NSDC) Secretary Oleksiy Danilov in his article ‘Putin’s Strategy 2023’ for Ukrainska Pravda.

Danilov believes the Russian leadership did not abandon its maximalist goal of destroying Ukraine. Moscow wants to destroy Ukraine itself as a historical phenomenon: language, history, culture, bearers of Ukrainian identity. Total and absolute genocide. Total war of destruction. The Kremlin knows: otherwise, Russia itself will disappear as an unfinished remnant of the tyranny of the past, a country of evil and violence. To achieve his goal, Putin wants to inflict a military defeat on Ukraine, strategic in nature and consequences, Danilov noted.

In his words, Russian commanders are concentrating resources, bringing up reserves, restoring combat capacity and seeking the most vulnerable areas of the Ukrainian front. According to Danilov, the maximum objective for the Russian military is to break through Ukraine’s defense in operational directions, such as the south of Ukraine, complete the seizure of the Donetsk and Luhansk regions, capture Kyiv as ‘Putin’s key fantasy’, and disrupt arms supply routes.

Russia is preparing for the offensive, whose first sign, according to the established tactics, is the implementation of active information measures. Before tanks start firing, poisonous information gases are released, which consist of lies, manipulations, fakes and disinformation, activation of agents of the information front, Danilov stressed.

In his word, Russian forces wants to break the will of Ukrainians and sow distrust in the Armed Forces of Ukraine.[…] According to Danilov, Ukraine in February 2023 is completely different from that in February 2022. Now, the country has unprecedented global support, multibillion aid, and  the West is united. Most importantly, there is the Ukrainian spirit of freedom, and the political nation has formed that tasted victory.

At the same time, Danilov believes that it is not yet time to relax, because there are many trials, blood, deaths and hard work ahead. In his words, Russian forces is strong and insidious. Russia still has missiles and tons of ‘military steel’ left. Russian troops are getting smarter, gaining experience and learning from their mistakes.”

Naiev: New units created in Armed Forces of Ukraine to be equipped with new Western equipment, Ukrinform reports. “We need a large number of Western tanks. They are much better than the Soviet models and can help us advance. We are creating new military units. And our next actions will depend on their combat readiness. Therefore, Western assistance is extremely important,” Commander of the Joint Forces, Lieutenant General Serhiy Naiev told CNN.

The Ukrainian military has to train units on the new equipment and integrate it into its existing formations, he noted. The whole unit should be equipped with the same vehicle, so a whole battalion is equipped with Bradley, if we get it, or with Leopards, Naiev said. […]

https://twitter.com/EuromaidanPress/status/1617223293710262275

Defense Minister of Ukraine Oleksii Reznikov reported agreements with Poland and Britain to start training missions for Ukrainian crews on Leopard and Challenger tanks, respectively.”

Ukraine’s military leadership to create personnel reserves – Zelenskyy, Ukrainska Pravda reports. “Answering the question about replenishing the personnel of the Ukrainian army, Zelenskyy said that the military leadership was instructed to create reserves so that the defenders could restore forces after combat actions. […]

The President noted that he could not disclose the details of the mobilisation processes, but the Staff of the Supreme Commander-in-Chief made the relevant decisions, and the commanders are now working on their implementation in their areas.”

Ukraine’s Defence Intelligence sent agent to talks with Russia before 2022 invasion to play for time, Ukrainska Pravda reports, citing “Radio Liberty“. “Kуrylo Budanov, Head of the Main Intelligence Directorate of Ukraine’s Defence Ministry, has revealed that intelligence officer Denys Kirieiev went to talks in Minsk in order to drag out the negotiations with Russia and buy some time. […]

Since this person [Denys Kirieiev] is now dead, we can say this: the main task that we set for him was to delay the process, to buy time, since Mr Kirieiev personally knew two people from the negotiation process who represented the Russian side.

I can express my subjective opinion. I want to emphasise this once again: the person who deliberately did this [killed Kirieiev – ed.], did it to prevent us from interfering in someone else’s game and delaying this process to allow our Armed Forces of Ukraine, let’s say, to take certain actions to repel Russian forces.

If you remember those events, the situation was close to critical then. I think you should remember that very well. And there was a certain number of people who, let’s just say, did not want Ukraine to win.”

 

1. Consequences and what to do? 

The NATO Alliance Is Holding Strong on Ukraine. But Fractures Are Emerging, The New York Times reports. “The allies differ on strategy for the coming year and the more immediate question of what Ukraine needs ahead of a major offensive in the spring. The billions of dollars in new arms for Ukraine announced this month — including British tanks, American fighting vehicles and howitzers from Denmark and Sweden — are testament to President Vladimir V. Putin’s failure to split the NATO allies after nearly a year of war. But small yet significant fractures are getting too big to hide.

The differences are over strategy for the coming year and the more immediate question of what Ukraine needs in the next few months, as both sides in the war prepare for major offensives in the spring. And while most of those debates take place behind closed doors, Britain’s impatience with the current pace of aid and Germany’s refusal to provide Leopard 2 tanks to Ukraine broke out into public view this week.

When the new British foreign secretary, James Cleverly, visited Washington this week, he gathered reporters for lunch and made the case that it is possible for Ukraine to score a “victory” in the war this year if the allies move fast to exploit Russia’s weaknesses. Officials in Poland, the Baltic States and Finland have largely agreed with the British assessment.

American officials pushed back, saying it is critical to pace the aid, and not flood Ukraine with equipment its troops cannot yet operate. And they argue that in a world of limited resources, it would be wise to keep something in reserve for what the Pentagon believes will likely be a drawn-out conflict, in which Russia will try to wear Ukraine down with relentless barrages and tactics reminiscent of World War I and II.

On Friday, at the conclusion of a meeting in Germany of the dozens of nations supplying the war effort, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Gen. Mark A. Milley, repeated the assessment he has offered since the fall. “For this year it would be very, very difficult to militarily eject the Russian forces,” he said. The best that could be hoped for is pressing Russia into a diplomatic negotiation — the way most wars end — though senior American diplomats say they have low expectations that Mr. Putin will enter serious talks.

Then came the more immediate blowup with the German government of Chancellor Olaf Scholz, over his refusal to send what many military experts believe could be a decisive weapon in Ukrainian hands: the German-built Leopard 2 tanks.

Secretary of Defense Lloyd J. Austin III spent several days trying to persuade the Germans to ship them, or at least allow Poland and other nations that use the tanks to re-export them. But by the time the meeting with scores of allies ended, the German defense minister, Boris Pistorius, reported that no agreement had been reached, although he said they would make a decision as soon as possible. He and Mr. Austin tried to focus on the unity of the effort to confront Russia, rather than the obvious rift over arms. […]

In interviews with American, British and other European officials, including senior military leaders, it is clear that Ukraine is different. Only the Ukrainians are on the line, and no one wants to tell them how to fight a battle in which their forces, the only ones engaged in the daily brutality, have shown both grit and determination. But with both Russia and Ukraine planning fresh offensives, the debate over strategy and arms has reached what the NATO secretary general has called an inflection point. […]

American officials were clearly frustrated after their negotiations with the German government this week. Germany had begun by saying that it would send Leopard tanks, and authorize others to, if the United States sent its M-1 Abrams tank as well. The United States declined, saying the tank is such a gas guzzler — it employs a jet engine — and requires such a supply line to keep running that it would not be useful in Ukraine’s environment. (The officials dodged questions about why a tank so difficult to operate on European battlefields is in the American arsenal.)

The British Challengers and German Leopards are more flexible and easier to run. But in public, Mr. Austin and others avoided criticizing Mr. Scholz, who in their view has managed the biggest reversal of German foreign policy — starting with the suspension of two pipelines bringing gas from Russia — quite skillfully.

Mr. Scholz’s real concern, they suspect, is that he does not believe the world is ready to see German tanks near the borders of Russia, a reminder of the Nazi invasion in World War II. One senior American official said this week that if Mr. Scholz and the German public are worried about that, in these circumstances they are the only ones who are.

While Germany did not say yes to sending Leopard tanks this week, it didn’t say no, either — at least not yet. But Ukraine has a very narrow window of time in which to launch a potentially decisive spring offensive before the Russians do, and the tanks are a key part of that effort. Before that launch, Ukraine has to muster thousands of combat-ready troops, receive new advanced weapons from the West, and train their soldiers in how to use and maintain those arms. Getting all that done would be, according to General Milley, a very, very heavy lift.

That’s why Germany’s delay on approving tanks was so frustrating to Mr. Austin and other top Western officials who had been trying all week to reach an agreement with their German counterparts to provide what Ukraine needs now to wrest back territory. […]  Speaking about the current German position, a British official said that London’s commitment to send Challenger tanks was intended to encourage other nations to do likewise, and that the British government still hoped it would. […]

Mr. Austin signaled the calendar is not on Ukraine’s side. “We have a window of opportunity here, between now and the spring,” he said. That’s not a long time.”

Germany is refusing to send tanks to Ukraine. Biden cannot let this stand, The Washington Post Editorial Board argues. “Vladimir Putin launched his illegal invasion of Ukraine 11 months ago not only believing he would quickly subjugate Ukraine but also on the assumption that the Western alliance was too weak and divided to put up a united front to thwart him. Both expectations proved disastrously wrong — until Friday, when Germany’s refusal to approve the transfer of dozens of heavy battle tanks to Ukraine opened the first serious crack in what had been NATO’s solid front. That fissure needs to be quickly patched. Left unresolved, the Kremlin’s dictator is certain to try to exploit it, not only on the battlefield but also in the parallel conflict zone of European public opinion.

In addition to Western sanctions against Russia, which will take an increasing toll on the Russian economy and undercut its resupply of high-tech weapons over time, military aid for Ukraine has been key to Ukraine’s survival and ability to blunt Moscow’s superior numbers of troops on the battlefield. Germany has given Ukraine more military aid than any country but the United States and Britain.

The fact of Germany’s multibillion dollar commitment is testament to the remarkable recalibration in Berlin’s thinking that occurred immediately after Russia’s invasion. Having pursued one decades-long strategy toward Moscow — promoting economic partnerships and codependence based on the premise that such a policy would render a European war unthinkable — Chancellor Olaf Scholz executed an abrupt about-face days after Russian troops and armor flooded into Ukraine. He announced a major long-term increase in German military spending and made clear Berlin would stand with its NATO allies against an unprovoked war of aggression.

That was a credit to what appeared to be a clear-eyed assessment of the existential threat to the Western order posed by Mr. Putin’s brazen assault on a sovereign nation. Mr. Scholz understood clearly that Ukraine’s only “sin” was aspiring to be a fully European nation — democratic, pluralistic, tolerant and modern. And he understood that if Russia were granted impunity after invading a big European country such as Ukraine, smaller European countries were also at risk from Mr. Putin’s imperial fantasies.

But that message has apparently not been fully received by a portion of Germany’s coalition government and its public. Polls suggest that while German support generally for Ukraine remains relatively high — though less so than in other Western countries — it is split almost equally on the question of sending German-made main battle tanks to Ukraine.

Germany’s Leopard 2 tanks, several thousand of which are in the arsenals of its NATO allies around Europe, are the best such options for Ukraine’s use. They are far more numerous than British Challenger 2 tanks, about 14 of which are being delivered to Ukraine, and more suitable for Ukrainian terrain and maintenance abilities than the United States’ top-of-the-line battle tank, the M1 Abrams. Several European countries with Leopards in their arsenals have signaled they are ready to ship them immediately to Ukraine, including NATO members Poland and Denmark, as well as Finland, which has applied to join the alliance. But those shipments must first be approved by Germany, which insisted on a right-to-refusal in its arms sale contracts.

Mr. Scholz is sacrificing sound strategy on the altar of political calculation by wavering in the face of opposition from some political allies and a segment of the German electorate. It is a misjudgment that cannot stand.

Some officials in Berlin have suggested they would send Leopards to Ukraine if the Biden administration goes first, and provides political cover, by sending some US-made Abrams tanks to Kyiv. Washington has so far been reluctant to do that, regarding the gargantuan, gas-guzzling Abrams, which requires constant maintenance, as a poor fit with Ukraine’s terrain and capabilities. That might be an accurate technical assessment.

Yet if sending some Abrams tanks is the key to breaking the impasse on a potentially much greater shipment of Leopards, President Biden should give his assent. He should do so not only to add muscle to Ukraine’s arsenal at what is likely to be a decisive moment in the war, but also to maintain Western resolve and unity in the face of the gravest threat it has faced in more than a generation.

Ukraine, whose own supply of Soviet-made battle tanks has dwindled as the war has dragged on, is in an existential fight. Its struggle is also a crucible for Europe and an assault against the most basic precept on which the Western system rests: the impermissibility of unprovoked wars of aggression. Tanks alone will not win that war. Ukraine also needs large numbers of lighter fighting vehicles, armored personnel carriers, howitzers, modern air defense systems and a constant resupply of artillery shells, which it has been using at a rate of roughly 3,000 per day. Still, the top Ukrainian military commander has said Ukraine needs 300 Western-made battle tanks, which would be a formidable component in Kyiv’s ability not just to hold its own lines but also to push Russia back from territory it has occupied illegally.

Moscow is gearing up for a major spring offensive, expected to start in the next two months. Ukraine might launch one of its own. What is at stake is not only Ukraine’s survival, but also leadership and clear-eyed thinking in Washington and Berlin. Germany’s hesitation is a critical challenge to Western unity, and Mr. Biden cannot sit pat in the face of it.”

 

Hans Petter Midttun: Today’s assessment will be published as a separate article. A teaser:

“Both The New York Times and The Washington Post sees the failure to deliver tanks to Ukraine as the first sign of discord within NATO. It is not the first. It is not even the second indication of an Alliance facing internal strife.

I can easily list at least 8 signs of discord.

The German reluctance to provide Leopard 2 tanks to Ukraine, however, is not the eighth sign of discord. It is only a part of a much larger problem. The eighth sign of discord is the NATO member state’s refusal to deliver any of the tools Ukraine needs to evict the Russian forces from its territory.

While Eastern Europe is giving all they have, Western Europe and the US are not only holding back but are in parts supplying old, low-tech equipment.

Countries in Eastern Europe are already defending their independence and sovereignty. Their line of defence is in eastern Ukraine.

The rest of NATO is not only partly ignoring Ukraine’s call for support but also ignoring the call from NATO members to act to stop a conflict that affects their security.

The bottom line is that NATO is not united. NATO has lost credibility for walking away from past ambitions and not acting according to its previous strategic concept. It’s divided between those who remember occupation and those who do not. It’s split between those who want to defend European security and stability and those who remain uncommitted. It’s divided between east and west, and between those who invest in security and defence and those who have not.

NATO needs to be united in the face of a broader confrontation. Discord leaves it vulnerable to Russia’s effort to split the Alliance and weaken the trans-Atlantic link.

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