Ukrainian forces need the weapons to pursue a rapid victory over Russia, according to the United Kingdom’s top diplomat, who warned NATO allies to brace for Kremlin threats if Ukraine enjoys success.
“This is the time, if we want to bring this to a successful conclusion — and, of course, we should, and we do — we should look to bring it to a conclusion quickly,” British Foreign Secretary James Cleverly told a Center for Strategic and International Studies audience in Washington. “We need to intensify our support at this point in time, whilst Russia has been on the back foot to give the Ukrainians the tools that they need to get the job done.”
Cleverly is in Washington on the heels of British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak authorizing the transfer of a squadron of Challenger 2 main battle tanks to Ukrainian forces, which need heavy armor to attack the fortifications that Russian forces have built across occupied territories of Ukraine. And while he urged allies to press for a quick victory, he paired that proposal with a statement that they must also prove that they can outlast Russian President Vladimir Putin if necessary.
“We do need to ensure that we support the Ukrainians [with] that strategic endurance, that we demonstrate to Putin that we are going to stick with it,” he said. “Because if we don’t, the message that we’re sending to the world and to every potential aggressor around the world is that if you’re willing to stick with it for a little bit longer than us, you will ultimately be victorious.”
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Cleverly’s misgiving is the latest indication that Western and Ukrainian officials fear that time could play into Putin’s hands, either by virtue of new mobilization drives, the training of conscripts, or the acquisition of new armaments to replace the losses sustained by Russian forces over the last year.
“NATO allies are sending what they can, but we see from all the overall information, what is happening in the front, that Russia can send more troops, more soldiers, more, just, people to the front,” a senior European official told the Washington Examiner last week. “And this is, for Ukrainians, in the long run, it is really a bad option.”
Putin intends to grow the Russian military to about 1.5 million troops, according to a new announcement by Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu. The task of equipping those forces will be a difficult one, if Western officials can help it, due to sanctions designed to restrict Russian access to foreign supplies needed for arms manufacturing.
“We continue to closely monitor how Russia’s long-range strike campaign will evolve as it eats deeper into its strategic reserves of modern missiles,” British Defense Secretary Ben Wallace told the House of Commons on Monday. “It is notable that Russia are now using the forced labor of convicts to manufacture weaponry.”
Cleverly elaborated on Wallace’s hint about Russia’s dwindling missile stockpiles. “So, until recently, his attacks on civilian infrastructure have been done with cruise missiles,” he said. “He’s now using ballistic missiles to do the same thing — much, much, much more expensive. And he’s doing it, clearly, because he’s running low on stocks of other munitions.”
The British official invoked Russia’s perceived weapons shortages to reinforce the case for a new influx of aid to Ukraine, but he cautioned that Putin would try to intimidate Western allies in the event that Ukraine launches another successful counteroffensive.
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“We know that will inevitably mean that they’ll start using much more escalatory rhetoric,” Cleverly said. “We know that means they will talk about perhaps trying to expand the scope of the conflict. We know that these are things that they will inevitably do as they feel under increased military pressure and, indeed, diplomatic pressure on the world stage … we shouldn’t allow ourselves to be put off or distracted or demoralized because what we are doing and the importance of what we’re doing transcends Ukraine in itself.”
