Now in its third year, Russia’s Special Military Operation (SMO), precipitated by the overthrow of neighboring Ukraine’s elected government and the subsequent militarization of the country by the US and the rest of NATO, is admittedly benefiting from Russia’s immense military industrial base.

The collective Western media, once replete with stories of shoddy, antiquated Russian weapons being flattened by “game-changing” NATO weapons, now features headlines about the growing gap between Russian military production and NATO’s inability to catch up. Other headlines now admit that previously vaunted NATO weapons have shortcomings exposed over the course of the past 2 years plus of fighting.

Buried in Steel: Russian Artillery Shell and Glide Bomb Production

Among these headlines is Sky News’ late May 2024 article, “Russia is producing artillery shells around three times faster than Ukraine’s Western allies and for about a quarter of the cost,” which admits:

The research on artillery rounds by Bain & Company, which drew on publicly available information, found that Russian factories were forecast to manufacture or refurbish about 4.5 million artillery shells this year compared with a combined production of about 1.3 million rounds across European nations and the US.

Artillery is among the most decisive factors deciding the fighting in Ukraine. According to the US government and Western corporate-funded Council on Foreign Relations, an April 2024 brief titled, “Weapons of War: The Race Between Russia and Ukraine,” notes:

Artillery has been known as the “king of battle” for centuries, and this largely remains true today. In the Russia-Ukraine war, artillery fire accounts for about 80 percent of the casualties on both sides. That makes it all the more ominous that in recent months, following the U.S. aid cutoff, Ukraine went from being outgunned five to one in artillery fire to ten to one.

If Ukraine is outgunned anywhere between 5:1 to 10:1, this means its casualties will likewise reflect this disparity. According to various Western sources including the British Ministry of Defense, if Russia has suffered “355,000” casualties, Ukraine has suffered approximately 5 to 10 times more, or 1.7 million to 3.5 million Ukrainian casualties.

More realistically, Russian losses are more likely 50,000 versus half a million Ukrainian losses.

Another growing area of concern for NATO and its Ukrainian proxies is Russia’s use of precision-guided glide bombs dropped by Russian warplanes outside the range of what remains of Ukrainian air defenses, able to target and dismantle Ukrainian fortifications on a scale that even Russia’s immense artillery advantage is incapable of.

The BBC, in a late May 2024 article titled, “Russia’s glide bombs devastating Ukraine’s cities on the cheap,” would explain:

Russia is increasingly using “glide bombs” – cheap but highly destructive ordnance – to advance its offensive in Ukraine.

More than 200 of them are thought to have been used in just a week to pound Ukraine’s northern town of Vovchansk during Russia’s current cross-border advance near Kharkiv.

President Volodymyr Zelensky said 3,000 such bombs were dropped on the country in March alone.

While Ukraine has received the US equivalent, the Joint Direct Attack Munition (JDAM), with its dwindling number of warplanes........

© New Eastern Outlook