Wars are fought with guns and ammunition. And when they last a long time they mean a lot of consumption of both ammo and weapons. This creates serious logistical problems for the belligerents and adds even greater costs to them, on top of the costs already incurred by bombing and operations.
For example, Russia uses about 20,000 artillery shells per day in Ukraine every day, which the US considers to exceed the production capacity of the Russian military industry today.
Accordingly, there are estimates that the Ukrainian side fires 6000-7000 artillery shells every day, which is also a very large number.
Indicatively, it is mentioned to make a comparison, that the United States dropped much smaller amounts in Afghanistan, while its production capacity is about 15,000 missiles per month.
The use of artillery by the Ukrainians is so intense that the US Pentagon has set up a special repair infrastructure on Polish soil so that they can be repaired as quickly as possible, in particular the 142 towed M777 howitzers that the US has provided them, along with hundreds of thousands of missiles.
This means that the two warring countries are forced to search for ammunition. Russia, which has its own production of ammunition, has also concluded agreements with North Korea for the purchase of ammunition.
Ukraine, for its part, insists on seeking everything and ammunition from its Western allies. But even there there are serious problems in their ability to respond.
Germany’s shortcomings
Germany maintains that it is already running short of ammunition, and Germany’s defense ministry has claimed that at the moment, the amount of ammunition it has is enough to fight for about a week, with some arguing that the actual limit is less.
In addition, in Germany they have a problem in connection with the imports of cotton fibers from China which are necessary for the manufacture of cotton gunpowder for artillery.
Part of the problem especially in Germany is the fact that despite Scholz announcing a special fund of 100 billion euros to better equip and upgrade the German armed forces, at the same time the budget includes only 1.1 billion euros for ammunition.
Then other problems arise. Germany gave Ukraine self-propelled Gepard anti-aircraft guns that it did not use, but they proved particularly useful in defense against Russian guided missiles and Iranian-made drones used by the Russian armed forces.
But they also wanted their ammunition, 35mm shells. These were produced by the defunct Swiss company Oerlikon-Bührle and Germany had bought them years before. But the agreement to buy the munitions from Germany clearly stipulated that Swiss permission was needed to resell or offer the munitions elsewhere. Except that Switzerland maintains a very strong neutrality law that prohibits the sale of arms and ammunition to areas of war. Denmark faced the same problem when it was banned by the Swiss side from offering Piranha III armored vehicles to Ukraine.
It is estimated that Germany needs about 20 billion euros to be able to replenish its ammunition stocks. However, despite repeated demands by Defense Minister Christine Lambrecht, who comes from the Social Democrats, for extra funding for munitions production, Finance Minister Christian Lindner, leader of the Free Democrats, is resisting, so the problem continues.
Russia facing sanctions
And Russia needs more equipment, with the problem being both the ability of Russian war industries to cope and – most importantly – the problem of high-tech equipment for computers, guidance systems, detonators and sensors.
Russia buys a lot of these from other countries. But these supplies are often subject to sanctions restrictions as well. However, it appears that the Russian side has proven particularly adept at circumventing them, as evidenced by the number of Russian weapons systems in use in Ukraine that Ukrainian and US authorities have found to be carrying high-tech Western components. In fact, American justice has prosecuted Russians for circumventing these sanctions.
Shortages in the US too
However, the US, which has provided Ukraine with over 19 billion dollars in equipment aid, also faces shortages. Already some systems such as the Stinger man-portable missiles and the Javelin, anti-tank systems are experiencing some shortages, although the Stingers were being replaced. Here again the biggest problem is with the ammunition, especially the 155mm shells for the artillery. Recently, the United States made an agreement to purchase 100,000 missiles of this caliber with South Korea, whose defense industry is constantly developing.
Opportunities for war industries
All this implies significant profit prospects for the defense industries. It is enough to think that we are talking about an industry where the 100 largest arms and military services companies had in 2021 sales of 592 billion dollars worldwide.
Supply chain problems remain, but everyone expects demand for weapons systems and ammunition to increase in the near future. Therefore their profitability.
