Ammunition for NASAMS and HIMARS: The US announced a new aid package to Ukraine

The US Department of Defense announced the provision of additional security assistance to meet Ukraine’s critical security and defense needs.

As indicated on the Pentagon’s website, it is about the allocation of up to $125 million from the Pentagon’s reserves of security assistance to meet Ukraine’s urgent needs on the battlefield, as well as $300 million within the framework of the Ukraine Security Assistance Initiative (USAI) to strengthen Ukraine’s air defense in the long term.

– This package includes the fiftieth tranche allocated by the Biden administration from the reserves of the US Department of Defense for Ukraine from August 2021, including additional air defense equipment, artillery ammunition, anti-tank weapons and other equipment designed to help Ukraine resist Russia’s protracted war of aggression, – it says messages

In general, the assistance package includes:

• additional ammunition for national anti-aircraft missile systems (NASAMS);
• additional ammunition for highly mobile artillery rocket systems (HIMARS);
• 155-mm and 105-mm artillery shells;
• missiles with optical guidance (TOW);
• Javelin and AT-4 anti-tank complexes;
• more than 3 million cartridges for small arms and grenades;
• ammunition for demining obstacles;
• anti-personnel ammunition M18A1 Claymore;
• 12 trucks for transporting heavy equipment;
• equipment for cold weather;
• spare parts, maintenance and other field equipment.

As part of the USAI project, the Ministry of Defense will provide Ukraine with:

• Additional laser-guided munitions for combating unmanned aerial vehicles.

What is the USAI project under which the assistance was provided

In contrast to the US President’s authority to provide assistance from Pentagon warehouses through direct cuts, USAI is the agency through which the United States procures supplies and equipment for Ukraine from industrial enterprises.

This USAI package provides for the use of $300 million provided under the Continuing Resolution recently passed by Congress and exhausts the remaining USAI funds currently available to support Ukraine.

The US President’s Administration emphasized that they continue to call on Congress to fulfill its obligations to the people of Ukraine by allocating additional funding so that Ukraine has everything it needs to defend itself against the war that Russia has chosen.

It will be recalled that earlier the US Ambassador to Ukraine Bridget Brink said that during the entire period of support of the Ukrainian Armed Forces, her department did not see cases of embezzlement of military aid given to Ukraine.

Photo: DOD