SUPPORTING UKRAINE WITHOUT AMERICA

HOW WILL EUROPE+ COPE SUPPORTING THE UKRAINIANS IF AMERICA WITHDRAWS ALL AID & SERVICES?

It’s a vital question given the current predicament and the American desire to satisfy not Ukraine’s rightful need for peace, restitution and justice, but to satisfy its own greed and maintain Putin in power in Russia to make it happen.

The US has agreed to supply weapons to NATO that it pays for under the PURL deal, and to allow those weapons to be supplied to Ukraine. This doesn’t just cover new weapons but spare parts for the hundreds of vehicles and systems from the M113 variants to the Bradley and bullets for guns, F-16 spares and on and on. There’s no viable way of replacing those items through European sources.

That would mean progressive cannibalization of what Ukraine has, to keep what it can keep going. I know for example that Ukraine has been producing parts for some vehicles like the ubiquitous M-113 APC in-country and can pretty much keep them going without outside help. It’s a very old and very simple machine so that’s viable. Its when we get to the more complex computer assisted and technology dependent systems this breaks down more quickly.

In some ways it’s far less about the vehicles than it was. The war has changed, and the type of vehicles in use has gone the same way. Mostly gone it seems are the days when we see even sniper Leopard-2’s or M-1’s on the front doing anything. It’s about self propelled artillery that can set up and go after firing. It’s about HIMARS and small mildly militarized utility trucks – the type so many fund raisers try to buy for the Ukrainian military. They need these to move smart and fast and they lose them at an alarming rate, so a constant supply is vital.

Keeping the F-16 fleet airborne is critical, as is the supply of weapons for them. Just as crucial is keeping the Patriot batteries operational, and the NASAMS systems.

Then there’s the testy area of intelligence support. Ukraine needs the intel provided by the US satellite network of KH-11 variants but especially the Maxar and other data provided by the National Reconnaissance Office. They buy the data and then permit its transfer to Ukraine. If they stop the transfer to Ukraine it cannot just offer to buy the data direct – not in the quality and volumes that might be required. However more and more progress is being made on a Europea+ ESA program that aims to deliver the same data from ESA sources. However that’s a while away. Five years until it’s operational all being well. However European nations individually have stepped up their own communications and SIGINT capabilities, with all of the major military nations involved in their own projects, many of which are bearing fruit even as we speak. My article UKRAINE’S SPY SATELLITE DEPENDENCY IS OURS TOO goes some way to explaining where we were earlier this year.

France has a small but genuine spy satellite capability, largely because it has never trusted the United States. President De Gaulle always asked the question, ‘Would an American President sacrifice New York for Paris?’ We knew the answer in the 1960’s and we know it now so that has always been their reasoning for nuclear and technology independence. This may actually be crucial to Europe+ in the future.

So can we as Europeans provide Ukraine with what it needs from space? In terms of SIGINT and imagery yes. European defence firms like Airbus have access to capabilities they can easily be forced into utilizing as both France and Germany hold a ‘Golden Share’ to compel them to do so, though they would never decline. Processing it and analyzing it however is something that we don’t have on the scale of the DIA, CIA or NSA, but between France and the UK and Ukraine they can probably cobble something up that does the job. Germany is way behind in this sphere and so is Poland.

The thing is that once this type of information and process is established it soon takes on an organizational life of its own and gets things done. Necessity is the mother of invention, as Ukraine can attest.

The Starlink problem is again an issue if the US cuts all support, though technically Poland has a contract with it to supply Ukraine, and so does the US Government through the Pentagon. We’d have to see how that played out. Yet again Europe has a solution but UKRAINE’S SPY SATELLITE DEPENDENCY IS OURS TOO will describe one of the incoming services, but it’s not immediate.

I think we also have to hand it to the Europeans that while it took time – and it was starting from a very low level, and every war since 1866 has demonstrated that no amount of stockpiling weapons is ever enough in a lengthy war, and it always takes time to build capability, but Europe has gotten their now. The shells are being produced in sufficient numbers to provide a surplus, and losing the rather slower US factory build up isn’t really making a significant difference. I’d like to say 155mm is a 155mm but it isn’t. There are various minor issues between shells and they have had to be ironed out – it was a long acknowledged set of problems but nobody did anything about it until the Ukraine situation forced it. There is more standardization now than there has ever been.

On the ground and in the air there would be challenges. F-16 and Patriot are the two systems I worry most about. They require sophisticated weapons that take time to produce and rendering Ukraine’s defences pretty much useless by having no missiles for example, would be unconscionable in your mind and mine – but we’re talking Trump, anything is possible. While SAMP-T-NG is capable it’s still not a Patriot.

Overall most of the support being lost would be a seriously worrying challenge. Europe can get there eventually but we’re looking at a full five years for some of it, others we simply cannot replace, either because we don’t own the system or have access to its technology.

What we in the European+ system need to learn is that we must be more cooperative. The SAFE (“Security Action for Europe”), the EU’s new €150 billion defence loans and joint procurement fund program is a prime opportunity. However the UK is only participating in it as a ‘third country’ partner, because it would have to find £5.7 billion to participate as an EU equal member. The Government just doesn’t have the money, despite the huge long term benefit of the program to the UK. Canada however is joining.

The UK has a terrible reputation for cocked up procurement programs – the AJAX IFV is the latest monstrosity sucking up £6 billion, injuring 31 soldiers for life and needing a new chassis before it can be considered truly viable. These thing happen across all of Europe and indeed the world, but the problems lie at the source – over specification, tinkering with the design during initial build, failure to prevent endless ‘bolt on’ requirements beyond the initial scope of the system – and too often poor contract negotiations that let the defence companies off the hook when they hold much of the blame. Then there’s inconsistent and poor contract oversight by people who mean well but have nothing like the expertise to oversee such huge – and long term – programs.

There is an old saying that ‘less is more’. Keeping it essentially simple and even stupid, can be infinitely more effective than over complicating something. Having ten items that can do a job to within 90% satisfaction is better than having two that can do it to 95%. A rule of thumb is the last 5% is usually the most expensive, and often costs as much as the first 50% to achieve. So do you really need that 5%? At the cost of losing 80% of the number of operational units you could have had? That’s what we have to get past.

In many ways that’s how the USSR functioned but not for the same reasons. They wanted numbers to overwhelm the enemy with. They would rather have ten than two. The West chose to have two and not ten. Yes the quality and longevity was there but the kill rate and likelihood of being killed was actually higher. Both arguments hold water in given circumstances, but those have changed with the war in Ukraine.

Drones, tactics, electronic warfare, the vital importance of human infantry with experience, precision artillery, long range tactical air strikes, remote sensing and reconnaissance, air superiority both up and down from SAM’s to fighters, drone interception, and importantly for defenders, the ability to be mobile, the need to conceal. It’s all very different. Europe has the opportunity with its ally, Ukraine, to be ahead of the game. To learn and extrapolate where the future will take war. AI is going to be vital for analytics at every level. Knowing what to train Ai to do, to seek, to search, to recognize and ensure certainty, the inevitable war that Ai will potentially wage against other Ai’s in the cyber realm and in strategy and tactical formulation. We’re barely scratching the surface of the future.

Ukraine can lead us in the right direction. This is about us listening to them as much as them listening to us. We cannot be stuck in our previous mind sets we must be willing to extrapolate and take chances – but not expensive and dubious projects – keep them simple, efficient.

Supporting Ukraine for the next two years at least has to be about listening to them and what they want, then quickly and efficiently help provide it. And in doing so help ourselves understand the future shape of our own defence needs. Post war there will be a Europe+ with a defence industry monolith in its midst. Ukraine can and must be the leader.

There is though one caveat. War means necessity is the mother of invention. Without war we can but extrapolate and, every year that passes beyond the end of that war, the more chance we have to deviate from what is going to serve us brilliantly, to progressively less well as technology and tactics move on. We must be willing to retain our mental flexibility as to what we need and why, and not just produce the next shiny thing out of the profit orientated defence industrial complex box.

In the short term we face some difficulties aiding Ukraine, in the medium term it will be effectively overcome with issues, long term I’m not concerned, we will get there.

Our real problems will be what happens to Russia when the economy collapses and how do we handle the US for the next four years now we’ve seen the new Strategy Policy – possibly one of the most appalling documents ever written by any US administration.

The Analyst

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