Why hasn't Washington provided tanks to Ukraine?
The Hundred #31: September 22, 2022
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“Over the last 6 months, the US and its European allies have found themselves sending increasingly heavy weaponry to support Ukrainians fighting to gain back territory. The US has been reticent to get too heavily involved given the risk of the regional conflict escalating into a full-blown war between Russia and NATO. However, what may have been off the table in terms of materiel support earlier is now very much on the menu, including tanks. Putin’s army has proven to be less capable than originally thought, and the Ukrainians have proven exactly the opposite. It’s time to send the tanks.”
“Tanks need training programs and maintenance facilities to be viable, which take years to establish and operate. For example, an M-1 tank has four initial entry jobs (called military occupational specialties) with training times of up to 34 weeks. Although the training time could be shortened for pre-trained troops, this would take experienced troops away from the battlefield for months. Modern military equipment also requires a vast maintenance operation and a parts supply pipeline to keep systems running. Providing tanks without these things would risk expensive equipment being junked, which would undermine the bipartisan consensus for providing equipment to Ukraine.”
“The US did not directly provide tanks for Ukraine at first because they believed that tanks from the stocks of Soviet equipment in former Warsaw Pact states would be easier for Ukraine to use and because they felt tanks were not necessary for the defensive warfare that Ukraine was fighting early in the war. Now that Ukraine has demonstrated offensive capacity and Soviet stocks seem exhausted, they are more open to it but will still seek to satisfy the demand from stocks of German Leopards before resorting to the more costly and more difficult to use US tanks.”
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