Two more air defense systems capable of intercepting anything arrive in Ukraine – address by President Volodymyr Zelenskyy

2 February 2024 – 21:06

I wish you good health, dear Ukrainians!

Report on this day.

I held a Supreme Commander-in-Chief’s Staff meeting. Today’s focus was strongly on front-line issues, front-line supply, fortifications, and the protection of our energy networks. We have good results, including continuous growth in Ukrainian drone production. A clear plan for 2024 regarding drones is in place. We’re adding contracts, increasing funding. I thank each and every one who is contributing to the development of this area in our Defense Forces, implementing necessary changes. To everyone scaling up drone production, this truly preserves the lives of our soldiers.

Today, there was also a report on fortifications at the meeting. Prime Minister Shmyhal and Defense Minister Umerov reported on the speed of construction and financing. Tasks are being performed.

Of course, we discussed issues related to projectiles – we’re expediting manufacturers, contracting additional volumes. Priorities are entirely clear.

The situation on key front lines, with special attention to Avdiivka, where conditions are extremely difficult. I’m grateful to all the guys in positions – every soldier, every sergeant, all the combat commanders. Commander-in-Chief Zaluzhny, and commanders Moskaliov and Syrsky reported on the front issues.

A separate report regarding energy facilities – physical protection, recovery after strikes, and the progress of the heating season. I am grateful to everyone ensuring the stability of our energy and adding energy resilience to our state.

International work today. A talk with the President of Kazakhstan – our bilateral cooperation, we can add activity. I informed the President about our global work in preparing for the Global Peace Summit. And, of course, thanked the people of Kazakhstan and companies for their humanitarian support for our people and society. It is important to preserve a shared vision of principles. And most importantly – peace.

I had several meetings today. The Minister of Foreign Affairs of Canada – I thanked for the unwavering support of Ukraine, for the assistance that strengthens the most. We discussed the further agenda of our relations – Ukraine and Canada. And the work of the created coalition for the return of Ukrainian children deported to Russia. Today, at the meeting in Kyiv, this coalition began its work, and the Framework Document for its activities was presented. Canada is one of the coalition’s co-leaders, and I am grateful for the actions.

Also I had a meeting with the Minister for Foreign and European Affairs and Trade of Malta – the OSCE Chair-in-Office. For everyone worldwide who values international law, it is crucial to implement all points of the Peace Formula. This includes efforts to return Ukrainians who were deported to Russia.

Gradually, we are preparing for international work in the coming weeks. We need even more activity for our collective strength. Not only for Ukraine and Ukrainians, not only for Europe, but for all those in the world who strive for stability and value human life. There will be corresponding formats of work, and details are being prepared for new support packages for Ukraine.

And the main news today – the news we have all been eagerly anticipating. The news for which we have been working for months on various levels. Here is the result – two more air defense systems have arrived in Ukraine. All the details, of course, should not be discussed in public. But these are systems capable of intercepting anything. We will defend the regions. While the systems are still insufficient for the complete protection of Ukraine, we work towards this goal every day.

I am grateful to everyone who is helping Ukraine! Grateful to everyone strengthening Ukraine! I am thankful to each and every one fighting and working for Ukraine to succeed!

Glory to Ukraine! 

The reason:

Ukrainians are Based.

Last broadcast before this hero heads off to the front.

If anyone knows his twitter let me know! Let's support this champion ❤️🇺🇦 pic.twitter.com/sYiUlJmkMN

— Richard Woodruff 🇺🇦 (@frontlinekit) February 2, 2024

@ne_tlia <- this is her, I’m sure we can all help with her efforts

— WarTranslated (@wartranslated) February 2, 2024

Lithuania:

Another important military aid package from our Lithuanian friends, which includes detonation systems & thousands of rounds of ammunition for anti-tank grenade launchers.

Thank you, Lithuania!
Together, we are stronger!
🇺🇦🤝🇱🇹@Lithuanian_MoD https://t.co/hLEfBXPZKI

— Defense of Ukraine (@DefenceU) February 2, 2024

Bulgaria:

Bulgaria will soon deliver 100 of its old BTR-60 armored personnel carriers to Ukrainehttps://t.co/TbkwV8Suf0 pic.twitter.com/HTZdYju8Yx

— Special Kherson Cat 🐈🇺🇦 (@bayraktar_1love) February 2, 2024

Germany:

Bundestag deputies approved the state budget for 2024. About 7.6 billion euros are earmarked for military aid to Ukraine.https://t.co/O21pVtLgE5

— Special Kherson Cat 🐈🇺🇦 (@bayraktar_1love) February 2, 2024

Czechia:

SCOOP: Czechia has found 450K 155mm rounds for sale outside the EU and is pressuring EU countries to finance the purchase. w/ @joshposaner @jacopobarigazzi https://t.co/3WcfCI4Ztb

— Paul McLeary (@paulmcleary) February 2, 2024

PoliticoEU has the details:

BRUSSELS — Europe is falling way short on its pledge to send 1 million artillery shells to Ukraine by March, and the Czechs say it’s high time to look beyond the borders of the EU for supplies.

Ukrainian forces on the front lines are warning they are running perilously low on ammunition to take on the Russian invaders in a war dominated by artillery bombardments.

The EU had originally pledged to supply 1 million shells by March, and France led calls for Europe to build up its homegrown industrial prowess to deliver munitions to Kyiv. However, the EU now says 524,000 shells will reach Ukraine by the March deadline, with 1.1 million only promised by the end of the year.

Frustrated by this shortfall, Prague is pushing EU countries to finance the purchase of what it estimates are 450,000 rounds of artillery available outside the bloc, four diplomats and a person familiar with the talks told POLITICO.

When the EU was calibrating its military aid commitments in early 2023, France — the bloc’s defense industry leader — had been pushing to make sure that subsidies were focused only on local production, rather than being funnelled abroad.

But the Czech call raises the prospect that Europe would turn instead to arms companies in South Korea, Turkey and South Africa. The EU’s top diplomat Josep Borrell specifically mentioned that Korea — a major weapons producer — could be tapped for extra shells, according to the official.

The EU’s blueprint to boost ammunition supplies includes reimbursing countries with billions of euros through the European Peace Facility for sending shells from existing stockpiles. This would exist along with €1 billion to push joint procurement of ammunition by the European Defence Agency and €500 million to support ammunition production projects.

Now, with Kyiv reeling from the constant attrition of Russia’s assault along a 1,000 kilometer frontline, the country’s Defense Minister Rustem Umerov says there’s “shell hunger,” prompting friendly capitals to reconsider their military aid strategy.

One diplomat said the 450,000 figure was pitched during an informal meeting of EU defense ministers in Brussels on Wednesday. Czech Prime Minister Petr Fiala then told his counterparts during Thursday’s EU leaders’ summit that shells could be obtained from outside the EU to help the bloc meet its promise, according to another official briefed on the talks.

The EU is not the only ally failing to deliver. Political gridlock in Washington has also halted U.S. arms flows to Ukraine.

More at the link.

Hopefully Czechia’s plan works, because the cupboard is almost bare:

Ukrainian soldier on munition shortage at the front: “On average, we fire 15 shots per day. But there were days when we made more than 100…or haven’t made any at all. Now hostilities intensified in our direction, but we have as few shells as we used to” https://t.co/dBF4lyDcJQ

— Paul McLeary (@paulmcleary) February 2, 2024

Also, from PoliticoEU:

KYIV — Ukraine’s army has a big problem: It’s receiving too few artillery shells to properly defend its 1,000-kilometer frontline against Russian assaults.

Defense Minister Rustem Umerov described the situation as “shell hunger” to the artillery coalition — the French-led international grouping to send ammunition to Ukraine — earlier this month.

Ukraine is ramping up its domestic shell production, although the numbers are a secret, but still relies on its allies to supply the bulk of its ammunition. But too little is getting through to the troops.

The European Union had promised to send a million shells by March but won’t meet that target. EU foreign affairs chief Josep Borrell said this week that the bloc will ship only 524,000 shells by then, while promising 1.1 million by the end of the year.

Meanwhile, political gridlock in Washington has stopped all flows of military aid.

“We are now out of the military assistance that we’d been providing to Ukraine and we’ve even seen some evidence of what that means on the battlefield,” U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said at a joint press conference with NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg on Monday.

The stoppage is having a real impact on the troops dug into trenches in southern and eastern Ukraine.

“We’ve never had enough shells of 122 mm caliber … we’re getting them right from the factory,” a Ukrainian artilleryman fighting near Avdiivka, one of the hottest spots on the front, told POLITICO. He spoke on condition of being granted anonymity as he was not authorized to talk to the media.

“On average, we fire 15 shots per day. But there were days when we made more than 100 shots, or haven’t made any at all. Now hostilities intensified in our direction, but we have as few shells as we used to have,” the soldier added.

Speaking to the artillery coalition, Umerov admitted: “Russia vastly outnumbers us in daily artillery attacks. At different areas of the front and stages of hostilities, they fired 5-10 times more artillery shells than the Ukrainian forces.”

He added: “Russian military industry enables its troops to fire tens of thousands of projectiles at Ukrainian positions. As the situation on the battlefield shows, there is no substitute for modern artillery.”

But achieving a big increase in Ukraine’s ammunition supplies isn’t going to be easy.

“Today we have a war of such a scale that the entire capacity of the free world is not enough to support our consumption. We definitely cannot do this without help,” Ukraine’s Strategic Industries Minister Oleksandr Kamyshin told POLITICO.

The lack of shells is one of the key reasons the Ukrainian army has gone on the defensive along the whole front in the wake of this summer’s disappointing counteroffensive.

Less able to rely on artillery to hold back waves of attacking Russians, the Ukrainians are turning to FPV — or first-person view — drones to strike Russia’s tanks, armored vehicles and troops. The drones, often adapted hobby models equipped with bombs, have an onboard camera that enables operators to direct them to their targets with pinpoint accuracy.

That’s giving Ukraine a rare advantage over Russia. Its forces conducted 3,806 drone strikes from September to January while Russia only conducted 2,886, according to a count by the Kyiv-based Top Lead marketing agency.

A high-ranking Ukrainian army officer, speaking on condition of being granted anonymity, told POLITICO that Russians dominate the battlefield with their artillery. “And now, in some directions, this number sometimes exceeds our response many times over. That is why the use of FPV drones is one of the options for inflicting fire damage on the enemy, which is quite effective.”

He added that for now, Ukraine still has enough shells on hand to beat back any Russian breakthroughs.

“We have enough shells to defend ourselves at the moment, but to continue offensive actions we need help with ammunition. After all, during an offensive, it is necessary to have much more shells than your enemy has or at least the same amount,” the officer said.

While drones are helping keep the Russians at bay, that doesn’t mean more ammunition isn’t needed, said Mykola Bielieskov, senior military analyst with the Come Back Alive Charity Foundation, which helps the Ukrainian army with supplies.

“I believe that it will be difficult for us to fight only with FPV without classic artillery such as howitzers or [multiple rocket launch systems] plus at least 2,000-4,000 shells per day,” he said. “We need to maintain existing positions. And how to do it in the conditions of shell shortage is of course the challenge.”

Russia has far more arms and ammunition than Ukraine does, but is nevertheless having trouble maintaining the ferocious rate at which it is using ammunition.

Moscow has effectively transitioned the economy to a war footing and is ready for a long war of attrition. Its factories are churning out drones, tanks and shells, and the defense budget is the highest in Russia’s post-Soviet history.

In a televised conversation with President Vladimir Putin, Rostec defense conglomerate head Sergei Chemezov said in late December that the production of ammunition had increased fiftyfold since Moscow launched what it calls its “special military operation” in Ukraine.

And yet there are caveats.

Yury Fyodorov, a Prague-based independent military expert, said Russia’s army has drawn on old Soviet artillery stockpiles, but those are running out.

That’s where its geopolitical allies North Korea and Iran come in. According to Western officials and intelligence, they are supplying Russia with technology, shells and, possibly, ballistic missiles — although all involved parties deny it.

Fyodorov estimates Russia is firing about 10,000 shells daily, many more than Ukraine but still fewer than the tens of thousands per day at the beginning of the invasion.

That drop has forced the Russian military to rely on “meat assaults” — waves of troops to overwhelm Ukrainian defenses — in the protracted fight for the town of Avdiivka in eastern Ukraine.

“In my opinion the situation for Ukraine is dangerous, but not catastrophic,” Fyodorov said.

More at the link.

This is the link to General Zaluzhnyi’s essay in the original Ukrainian, as opposed to the English version that CNN published and that I excerpted yesterday. If any of our Ukrainian readers has time and the inclination to take a look, I’m curious to know how faithful CNN’s translation was to the original.

Kherson:

The consequences of the russian air strike on the center of Kherson.
russian terror must be stopped. #RussiaIsATerroristState

📸: Kherson Military Administration pic.twitter.com/wX6pmZ5hqH

— Defense of Ukraine (@DefenceU) February 2, 2024

Kherson pic.twitter.com/FJ4Di0HEno

— Illia Ponomarenko 🇺🇦 (@IAPonomarenko) February 2, 2024

Bereslav, Kherson Oblast:

Macron commented on the death of French volunteers as a result of a Russian attack on Bereslav, Kherson region. Yesterday, the administration of the Kherson region reported about this:

"Foreign volunteers were killed and injured due to an enemy strike on Beryslav.
Russian army… https://t.co/atB3dqta0i pic.twitter.com/dXpPcjTkPX

— Special Kherson Cat 🐈🇺🇦 (@bayraktar_1love) February 2, 2024

Macron commented on the death of French volunteers as a result of a Russian attack on Bereslav, Kherson region. Yesterday, the administration of the Kherson region reported about this:

“Foreign volunteers were killed and injured due to an enemy strike on Beryslav.
Russian army killed two French citizens. Three more foreigners received minor injuries. Among the wounded is also an activist of the organization’s Ukrainian representative office.
Sincere condolences to the families of the victims.”
https://t.me/olexandrprokudin/2687

Torske, Russian occupied Donetsk Oblast:

63rd Brigade's footage of the destruction of enemy units east of Torske with overlayed intercepted radio conversations.https://t.co/lL5QHJJ19vhttps://t.co/5KiY9bVZ88 pic.twitter.com/V5oDNJl9uD

— WarTranslated (@wartranslated) February 2, 2024

The Avdiivka front:

https://twitter.com/bayraktar_1love/status/1753365216316813734

https://twitter.com/bayraktar_1love/status/1753395941841801397

 

The Donetsk front:

72nd Brigade repelling attack of a big Russian AFV column on Donetsk front. https://t.co/SzCd08L6X5 pic.twitter.com/ejepGMWQpQ

— Special Kherson Cat 🐈🇺🇦 (@bayraktar_1love) February 2, 2024

Another angle on the destruction of the same Russian column as in the post attached. By Shadow unit and 72nd Brigade of Ukraine. https://t.co/a1kldjL1sc https://t.co/GM6W4DuuHc pic.twitter.com/nSQBgqCErf

— Special Kherson Cat 🐈🇺🇦 (@bayraktar_1love) February 2, 2024

NAFO expansion is, apparently non-negotiable!

😳😂 pic.twitter.com/VrOv39NBL0

— WarTranslated (@wartranslated) February 2, 2024

That’s enough for tonight.

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