US rushes to replace weapons sent to Ukraine — RT World News
After delivering nearly $18 billion worth of arms to kyiv since February, Washington is scrambling to restock its own arsenals
The U.S. military is accelerating its arms acquisition processes to replenish stocks depleted by the steady stream of arms shipments to Ukraine, a senior military official said Monday.
The country’s military is using lessons learned from the Covid-19 pandemic to speed up the process, Doug Bush, chief of acquisitions, told reporters. The accelerated procurement effort means processes that used to run in succession will now run concurrently, according to Reuters.
Washington has sent nearly $18 billion worth of weapons to Ukraine since Russia launched its military offensive in late February. The Pentagon also spent more than $2.6 billion between May and October to replenish key weapons stockpiles, according to recent contract data.
The Ministry of Defence, however, admitted that it would still be necessary “several years” for the U.S. military to be fully resupplied, according to a fact sheet seen last week by the New York Post.
The United States uses the special Presidential Drawdown Authority (PDA) to allow rapid arms transfers without congressional approval in an emergency.
According to Bush, about $1 billion in contracts have been awarded to arms manufacturers since the second half of October, mostly to restock ammunition and rockets. This included a $477 million contract with Lockheed Martin.
The pace of contracts is now “exceeding the Pentagon’s internal spending velocity criteria by 15%”, said Reuters.
The military received its first batch of funds to replace supplies sent to Ukraine in early May and receives a new installment every few weeks, ranging from a few hundred million dollars to almost a billion.
The United States is not the only country facing depleted arms stockpiles due to the conflict in Ukraine. The German military is currently facing severe ammunition shortages, Eva Hoegl, Bundestag commissioner for the armed forces, said on Sunday. While the shortfall has existed for years, it has been exacerbated by the shipment of arms from Berlin to kyiv. Hoegl warned that it would cost the army around 20 billion euros to replenish its ammunition stocks.
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Russia has repeatedly warned that the influx of Western weapons will only prolong the conflict, while making the United States and other NATO members de facto participants.
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