From this week#s Economist:-
Russias vast stocks of Soviet-era weaponry are running out - It may have to scale back its offensive in Ukraine
FOR A LONG time it seemed that a war of attrition between Ukraine and a Russia with five times its population could end only one way. But the much-vaunted Russian offensive against Kharkiv in the north that started in May is fizzling out. Its advances elsewhere along the line, especially in the Donbas region, have been both strategically trivial and achieved only at huge cost.
.The key issue is not manpower. Russia seems able to go on finding another 25,000 or so soldiers each month to retain around 470,000 men at the front. .. Production of missiles to strike Ukrainian infrastructure is also surging. But for all the talk of Russia having become a war economy, it is able to replace its staggering losses of tanks, armoured infantry vehicles and artillery only by drawing out of storage and refurbishing stocks built up in the Soviet era. Huge though these stocks are, they are not infinite.
According to most intelligence estimates, after the first two years of the war Russia had lost about 3,000 tanks and 5,000 other armoured vehicles. Oryx, a Dutch open-source intelligence site, puts the number of Russian tank losses for which it has either photo or videographic evidence at 3,235, but suggests the actual number is significantly higher.
When the then defence minister, Sergei Shoigu, boasted in December 2023 that 1,530 tanks had been delivered in the course of the year, he omitted to say that nearly 85% of them, were not new tanks but old ones (mainly T-72s, also T-62s and even some T-55s dating from just after the second world war) that had been taken out of storage and given a wash and brush-up.
Since the invasion, about 175 reasonably modern T-90M tanks have been sent to the front line. The IISS estimates that annual production this year could be approaching 90. However, Michael Gjerstad, an analyst with the IISS, argues that most of the T-90Ms are actually upgrades of older T-90As. As those numbers dwindle, production of newly built T-90Ms this year might be no more than 28. Pavel Luzin, an expert on Russian military capacity at the Washington-based Centre for European Policy Analysis, reckons that Russia can build only 30 brand-new tanks a year. When the Ukrainians captured a supposedly new T-90M last year, they found that its gun had been made in 1992. Mr Luzin reckons that Russias ability to build new tanks or infantry fighting vehicles, or even to refurbish old ones, is hampered by the difficulty of getting components. Stores of components for tank production that before the war were intended for use in 2025 have already been raided, while crucial equipment, such as fuel-heaters for diesel engines, high-voltage electrical systems and infrared thermal imaging to identify targets, were all previously imported from Europe. The lack of high-quality ball-bearings is also a constraint.
Ferroalloy production has actually decreased in the past two years, says Mr Luzin. Most welding in the weapons factories is still done by hand, and despite factories supposedly working triple shifts, Mr Luzin says that the firms are struggling to recruit enough workers. They also largely depend on machine tools imported years ago from Germany and Sweden, many of which are now old and hard to maintain. Moreover, the old Soviet armaments supply chain no longer exists. Ukraine, Georgia and East Germany were all important centres of Soviet weapons and components manufacture. Ironically, Kharkiv was the main producer of turrets for T-72 tanks. The number of workers in Russias military-industrial complex has also fallen from about 10m to 2m, without any offsetting step-change in automation. For now, with the help of North Korea, Russia appears to have enough shells, probably about 3m this year. But the drawback of such high rates of fire has been the wear and tear on barrels. In some highly contested areas, the barrels of howitzers need replacing after only a few months.
Both Mr Golts and Mr Luzin reckon that at current rates of attrition Russian tank and infantry-vehicle refurbishment from storage will have reached a critical point of exhaustion by the second half of next year. But the Russians will not want to reach a cliff-edge when they suddenly have only very few new tanks to send to the front. The new defence minister, Andrei Belousov, appears to be focused on ramping up production of drones. Unless something changes, before the end of this year, Russian forces may have to adjust their posture to one that is much more defensive, says Mr Gjerstad. It could even become apparent before the end of summer. Mr Putins interest in a temporary ceasefire may soon increase. ■
