Consequences for the US as its weapon inventory deplete

The most immediate implications of this will be for Ukraine.

To supply Ukraine️, the US has run down its weapons inventories so much that they will take three to seven years to replenish, even at surge rates, per new research by the Centre for Strategic and International Studies. At current rates of production, the time needed to replenish US weapons stocks would be pushed out years further than that.

This has significant implications for the ability of the US to continue supplying Ukraine and, perhaps more importantly, to defend Taiwan (as well as its ability to deter China from attacking Taiwan in the first place).

The United States has since February this year provided Ukraine with a range of military aid – from assault rifles and 5.56mm ammo right up to world leading intelligence, surveillance & reconnaissance capacity and its unique, Palantir-based 'algorithmic warfare' system.

Yet the weapons that have done most to prevent Ukrainian collapse on the battlefield can be split into four types: 155mm artillery and rounds; Anti Tank Guided Missiles (such as Javelins); Multiple Launch Rocket Systems (such as HIMARS) and the rockets for them; Man Portable Air Defence Systems (such as Stingers) and missiles for them.

The table linked here and placed below shows that inventories have been run down so much by supply to Ukraine that they will take a minimum of two and a half years to replace, and as many as seven years, even based on surge manufacture programmes.

Find this table at the CSIS website: https://www.csis.org/analysis/rebuilding-us-inventories-six-critical-systems

The US has provided Ukraine over one million 155mm artillery rounds of various types. At current rates of manufacture, the Pentagon would never be able to refill its inventories. Washington therefore plans to surge its capacity to 40,000 rounds a month – but only by 2025. Even this would satisfy only one third of Ukrainian needs, according to CSIS. This means that the US is going to have to procure 155mm ammo from beyond NATO – and it has already started doing so, from countries such as South Korea and Pakistan.

Given Europe has similarly reached its limits, other countries are also going to have to produce more in the medium term. Further, the US is in the meantime sending 105mm artillery and ammo (with less range and effectiveness) to close the gap. It seems, however, that given the supply constraints, Ukraine might have to start rationing use eventually.

The situation with Excalibur precision 155mm rounds is even worse. These high-tech rounds use a GPS guidance system to adjust their flight to the target and can thus achieve a tremendous degree of accuracy. The problem is that Washington has been sending Ukraine its annual production every month and, per CSIS, might soon run out of Excalibur rounds to send.

Soon after Russian tanks crossed the Ukrainian border, the Javelin anti-tank guided missile gained iconic status. Current production is 1,000 a year – but the US has provided 8,500 to Ukraine. Transfers have now stopped because the US is down to minimum limits. At current rates of manufacture, it would take 14.5 years to replenish supplies, but even at the surge levels, it is to take near seven, assuming no further transfers or diversion to other allies.

By the summer, Javelin had been replaced by HIMARS, a multiple rocket launch system, as the star weapons platform. Given the US has only provided twenty HIMARS, CSIS contends that they would only take two and a half years to replace, at surge rates.

More interestingly, though, the Pentagon has been, according to CSIS, “tight-lipped” about the rate at which these twenty HIMARS have been firing the GMLRS rockets the US has sent Ukraine. This reticence to share numbers makes it difficult to project the run down of the stocks; however, at a low use rate (400 a month) CSIS calculates that the US could continue providing Ukraine indefinitely.

At higher rates (1,000), however, limits would be reached in twenty months, CSIS estimates. Here, it might be worth highlighting out that in a recent US-Japan joint exercise, US Marines did not fire HIMARS for lack of GMLRS. This suggests that, in October at least, there was serious concern about availability – perhaps indicating that use was then at the higher end of the range.

Although inventories of Stinger MANPADS are particularly low, the US might be able to send more, given it is developing a replacement that will soon enter service.

The most immediate implications of this will be for Ukraine. The country is entirely reliant on the West – which ultimately means the United States of America – to be able to continue its effort. In the event the Pentagon’s weapons arsenal started reaching limits, Washington would be left with four options. First, compel Ukraine to negotiate. Second, send higher tech or more lethal weapons to replace those that had reached limits. Third, send lower or less lethal weapons to fill the gaps. Fourth, buy from third parties.

It seems, given the forthcoming provision of Bradley IFVs, self propelled artillery and, soon, it seems likely, main battle tanks, the West is definitely moving up the lethality chain. With the provision of 105mm artillery and TOW ATGMs, it is also moving down. As we have seen, it is also actively buying from third parties. There is no sign yet that the West is ready to negotiate at all, let alone so keen to do so that is ready to compel Ukraine to the table with Russia.

Nevertheless, with 155mm especially, but also other systems, it seems likely that Ukraine will have to start at least rationing at some stage. This would have battlefield implications (here, it must be noted that Russia might have to do likewise).

Secondly, for the United States, the run-down of weapons stockpiles puts it in a parlous position at a pivotal moment. It has correctly identified China as its main geostrategic threat, and Taiwan is clearly the main flashpoint in that conflict. Yet to confidently deter any Chinese attempt to take the island, Taiwan must embark on a concerted rearmament programme, and the US must be able to surge weapons there at a moment of crisis.

On the former, there is already a $19 billion backlog of Taiwan arms orders from the US – including for many of the same weapons systems that have been sent to Ukraine.

Clearing this backlog, and fulfilling greater orders from Taipei commensurate with the increased threat from China, is not going to be easy when the US must supply Ukraine, refill its own armouries and backfill allies who sent Soviet era systems to Ukraine. Further, how can the US surge supplies at a time of crisis when it is already on the limit of a range of systems that would need to be sent across the Pacific?

On Friday, Bournbrook wrote that US engagement in a trial of strength on Europe's Eastern Approaches harms its geostrategic standing and makes the eruption of a third world war more likely, because, coming as it does as Washington is ramping up diplomatic and trade pressure on China, it tempts Beijing to act while the US is weakest, before it has a chance to rebuild stocks and focus on Asia.

If it loses its position in the Western Pacific it risks losing its place as the preeminent world power and facing a genuine peer competitor for the first time since 1914. If Beijing seeks a military solution at a time Russia is seeking to neutralise Ukraine as a potential member of the Western Alliance, a third world war would de facto exist.

Yet this is exactly the outcome Washington is courting.