In early October, Ukraine received an advanced IRIS-T system from Germany with three more to be delivered by next year. Moscow’s weapon of choice is increasingly ineffective. Worse, NATO has supplied air defence systems to Ukraine that can take down incoming Russian missiles. ” In Ukraine, an old god failed, and a new one was born - long-range, precision-guided artillery which cuts through armies like a surgeon’s scalpel, instead of hammering them into submission. The new war machine has allowed Ukraine to do so without suffering the effects of counter-battery fire: Not a single HIMARS is believed to have been hit.įormer Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin is reputed to have called artillery the “god of war. In contrast, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization’s (NATO) standard 155 mm and 105 mm weapons systems - especially the M142 High-Mobility Artillery Rocket System, or HIMARS, which fires GPS-guided projectiles out to 50 miles - have devastated Russian ammunition dumps, command posts, and key bridges.

Even when hits were scored on command and control centres or logistics facilities, these were rapidly brought online again. The massive and unrelenting barrage of tactical missiles - the 21st-century version of artillery - failed to break the morale and will of Ukrainian soldiers. The Russian bombardments, though, failed to punch a hole in the Ukrainian defences. Estimates suggest that 1,100 missiles hit Ukraine in the first 10 days of the war alone.Įarlier this month, Russia was estimated to still be firing 20,000 artillery rounds per day compared to Ukraine’s 4,000 to 7,000 rounds, journalist Courtney Kube has noted, a rate not seen since the Korean War that lasted from 1950 to 1953. The war began with giant barrages of artillery fire - howitzers, rockets, and missiles - aimed at levelling Ukrainian forward positions and decapitating their command centres, before Russian tanks and troops moved in. Learning from such historic triumphs,Russian President Vladimir Putin’s military put their faith in missile troops and artillery to bludgeon their way past Ukraine’s defences.

Modern russian tank 155mm