According to a senior general, since the beginning of the war with Russia, the Ukrainian army has suffered heavy material losses. In an interview with an American magazine, the general in charge of logistics for the ground forces admitted that almost 50 percent of the country’s military equipment had been lost to fighting in recent months.
“To date, we have lost around 3040%, sometimes up to 50% of gear to active combat. Thus, we lost about 50%,” Brigadier General Volodimir Karpenko said in an interview with the National Defense magazine published on Wednesday (06/15).
Karpenko admitted that around 1,300 infantry fighting vehicles, 400 tanks and 700 artillery systems belonging to the Ukrainian armed forces were lost in the war. The general emphasized that this is an estimate based on the front line and the intensity of the conflict.
In the interview, Karpenko repeated the request for help to send more weapons to the country. “We received a large number of weapon systems, but that only covered 10% to 15% of our needs,” he said. “The war we see now in Ukraine last happened in 1945 when the world defeated evil.”
Ukraine has been demanding arms supplies since the Russian invasion began on February 24. A week ago, the country’s deputy military intelligence said that Ukrainian troops were outnumbered in artillery and were relying almost exclusively on Western weapons for resistance. Even the military almost ran out of ammunition at the front.
Several countries have already pledged aid to Ukraine. The United States recently pledged to send hightech intermediaterange missile systems. The launchers are part of a new US $700 million security assistance package for Ukraine that will also include helicopters, Javelintype antitank weapon systems, tactical vehicles and spare parts, among other items.
Germany, France, Denmark, the United Kingdom, Canada, Poland and other countries have also supplied or plan to supply arms to Ukraine.
Showdowns in Donbass
The front line of the war is currently focused on the Donbass region. The situation is particularly dramatic in Sieverodonetsk, where the Russian army bombed the Azot chemical plant, one of the city’s last points of resistance. According to Ukrainian sources, another 560 civilians, including 38 children, sought shelter in the factory’s bunkers.
Russian officials said on Saturday that no agreement had yet been reached to evacuate the factory and accused Ukrainians of refusing to accept a ceasefire agreement.
The city of Sievierodonetsk is the last stronghold of Ukrainian forces in Lugansk and the most active scene of hostilities in recent weeks. The Ukrainian armed forces isolated themselves in this chemical plant in a maneuver similar to that in Mariupol, where the Ukrainian army took refuge in the Azovstal Steel Plant, which eventually fell to Moscow power along with the entire city.
