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-Short Attention Span Theater-
Lead Time to Replace Munitions Supplied to Ukraine - Status FUBAR
2023-01-20
[CSIS] As the United States transfers massive amounts of weapons, munitions, and supplies to Ukraine, questions arise about the health of U.S. inventories. Are inventories getting too low? How long will it take to rebuild those inventories? An earlier CSIS commentary identified those inventories that are at risk as a result of transfers to Ukraine. This commentary continues that analysis by examining inventory replacement times. Most inventories, though not all, will take many years to replace. For most items, there are workarounds, but there may be a crisis brewing over artillery ammunition.
There is a nice table, colour coded, of the systems under discussion. Most are tagged with red — unlikely to rebuild inventories within five years. Discussion at the link.
Posted by:Griter Slash1619

#11  Somebody characterized Rus vs Ukr as a big Soviet army fighting a smaller Soviet army. All things being equal, the big Soviet army wins. The West is trying to change that equation by resupplying Ukraine, but people are still a limiting factor. Russia has a population of about 146 million, Ukraine is about 43 million.
Posted by: SteveS   2023-01-20 21:36  

#10   The thing in short supply will be Ukrainians.

Russians will also be in short supply soon enough, SteveS. I see a race to the bottom — who will run out of warm bodies first?
Posted by: trailing wife   2023-01-20 20:02  

#9  Looking at the long term future of the war, I would guesstimate Western military production capabilities to be roughly comparable to Russia. There are transportation issues that Russia does not have, and a "last mile" problem once stuff gets to Ukraine. Heavy equipment moves by rail. Rail in Ukraine is powered by electricity. Remember the on-going strikes against the Ukr electric grid? They are not going to stop.

The thing in short supply will be Ukrainians. I am not sure how NATO will deal with that. Perhaps at that point, we will decide that Russia has had enough.

Posted by: SteveS   2023-01-20 19:54  

#8  OK as long as we could defend Europe's most corrupt country.

We had no problem blowing our GDP when Stalin was our 'partner' 1941-45. Screw the 'morality' excuse.

BTW, you missed the 50s-90s, when we in fact were prepared to immolate ourselves for the benefit of the Euros who couldn't seem to find the money to defend themselves (who by the early 80s had a population and combined GDP to match the US).
Posted by: Procopius2k   2023-01-20 16:02  

#7  The Chinese couldn't do squat if we didn't enable them. It's the corruption and the enabling that bothers me.
Posted by: Abu Uluque   2023-01-20 13:17  

#6  Peter Zeihan already debunked the Taiwan invasion conspiracy theory. China needs the US as an export market or else they've got nobody to sell their crap to. Plus we'll cut them off from their oil supply. The Chinese know this, hell the whole world knows, Evidently this website's posters are dumb as a post though.
Posted by: Punky Elmigum9411   2023-01-20 10:40  

#5  Push the button? For fucking what?

What situation would possibly call for us to do that?

In gravest extreme, as an absolute last resort after we've already been attacked with nuclear weapons. Let me guess, this is part of last year's propaganda push to make people say that nuclear Armageddon and the end of all life as we know it would be OK as long as we could defend Europe's most corrupt country.
Posted by: Punky Elmigum9411   2023-01-20 10:37  

#4  Oddly enough, this reminds me of Bush's stop on fetal stem cell research with angst and crying from the entrenched researchers.

That act forced the scientific community to expand trials on alternative sourcing which blossomed into a "we can grow stem cells from anything" solution.

'Under armed' with insufficient munitions will likely drive development of more effective weapon systems and may turn the tide to technology away from tedious ground campaigns.
Posted by: Skidmark   2023-01-20 08:15  

#3  The munition is doing what it was made for. The fact that you allowed your production go cold is warning that you were never serious about avoiding nuclear exchange. It's like allowing your fire department to rust away without maintenance and proper equipment replacement, then have a big fire. A day late and a dollar short. You want a deep stockpile and maintain a active production capacity to buy you as much time as necessary to put off having the decision to 'push the button' or not.
Posted by: Procopius2k   2023-01-20 07:16  

#2  As planned, nothing will remain for a prolonged defense of Taiwan or South Korea.
Posted by: Besoeker   2023-01-20 06:18  

#1  Oh, no! We might be out of weapons and unable to start new wars for a while!

Pay attention to the note of panic at the idea that the military-industrial complex might be deprived of its lifeblood. Which is blood. Literal human blood, of real people who might be good friends and good neighbors if you had met them.
Posted by: Herman Hapsburg8987   2023-01-20 02:49  

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