Thread by @MarkUrban01

The most important single factor in feeding the Ukraine war is the supply of artillery ammunition (nb 152mm and 122mm for RU, those plus 155mm and 105mm for UA). I am now thinking Ukraine will get what it needs. The figures are mind boggling... 1/

In the run up to EU meetings this week @oleksiireznikov told European ministers Ukraine needs 350,000 rounds a month to sustain operations, of which 120k are rounds of 155mm needed for western supplied artillery (1.44m a year). Without that things slow right down. Now we know 2/

That EU ministers have agreed an 'ambition' to provide 1m rounds of 155mm in the next 12 months, with some combination of stripping their existing stocks (frankly I didn't think they had 1m...) and making new ones 3/

https://twitter.com/HPevkur/status/1637811884987498497

While there are some doubts about the exact sequencing of this EU supply, ie how much will be got to Ukraine in the next 2-3 key months, we also now know that a package announced by the US on 24/2 involves an additional 1 million 155mm rounds 4/

The US already sent 1.1m during the first year of the war &, since it can't scale up production fast enough, is having to run down stocks pre-positioned in places like Israel & South Korea (a risk, clearly). The other 230k needed each month includes mortars, rockets etc 5/

So what about Russia? Early on in the war I heard estimates they had a stockpile of 16m artillery rounds & rockets. Usage in the first year may have been 6-7m but despite the apparent surplus western officials are cagey about what RU has left 6/

One western expert told me 'we don't know, because the Russians themselves don't know' how many million shells are still in storage. He added that many of their stocks may be decades old and unusable. What seems clear is that... 7/

Russian hopes of buying large amounts of artillery ammo from North Korea or China have not (yet) materialised. "We don't see evidence" of Chinese weapons supply, one western official said today. And we know Wagner & others have grumbled about low supply of ammo 8/

But I think the salient conclusion is that while Russia *may well* have enough shells for the months ahead, we have sufficient transparency on the western picture to know that the US and EU are gearing up to send huge stocks incl 2m 155mm shells to Ukraine this year 9/END