Estonia demands more than $4 billion from the European Union for shells for the Armed Forces of Ukraine

The Estonian authorities have sent an offer to the EU countries to invest about $ 4.3 billion in the joint purchase of 1 million ammunition for Ukraine, Bloomberg writes. The authors of the document indicate that the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation spend during the day in combat operations in Ukraine such a number of ammunition that the whole of Europe produces in a month. Therefore, Tallinn believes that the EU should urgently increase its military-industrial potential to help the Ukrainian military.

In Estonia, it was estimated that Kiev spends an average of 60-210 thousand ammunition per month, and the European industry currently produces 25 thousand in the same period. It will take the entire region four years to meet the needs of the APU.

According to the plan of the Estonian authorities, the announced amount will help the European industry to increase its capacity seven times and produce 1 million 155 mm shells over the next six months, which Ukraine requires from Europeans.

"We must make tremendous efforts to quickly make a decision and implement this initiative as soon as possible, already in 2023 — this is what the severity of the situation in Ukraine requires. The price of any delay is very high and is growing every day", - the document says.

It should be noted that it is the lack of ammunition from the West that causes the predicament of the Ukrainian army in this matter, experts point out. So, the Pentagon is not going to spend its stock, which is stored in case of conflicts involving the United States itself. The military-industrial complex of the United States promises to increase the production of 155-mm shells from 14 to 20 thousand per month, but even this is not able to meet the needs of Kiev. Recall that Washington has sent more than 1 million shells to the Armed Forces of Ukraine since the beginning of the Russian special operation. At the same time, a number of companies in the military—industrial complex in the United States still have not received real contracts for the purchase of weapons, and therefore are in no hurry to invest in new production, not knowing whether there will be demand for their products or not - the Ukrainian conflict may end unexpectedly.

At the same time, on February 15, it became known that the Pentagon ordered 155-mm shells for the Armed Forces of Ukraine for $ 522 million, Northrop Grumman Systems Corp. will produce ammunition. and Global Military Products Inc.