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- cross-posted to:
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It took German industry an eyebrow-raising 19 months to refurbish and deliver the first 58 of at least 155 Leopard 1A5 tanks a German-led consortium has pledged to Ukraine. But the three-country consortium—Germany, The Netherlands and Belgium—has apparently resolved parts shortages and is finally picking up the pace.
Since those first 58 Leopard 1A5s arrived through early September, an additional 45 of the 1980s-vintage tanks have shipped.
It’s not about not able but not willing. And not in the “we don’t want to help Ukraine” sense, but in the “we don’t want to switch to a war economy, not even in part” one.
Lessons should definitely be learned about capacity to scale up, though. E.g. in future peace times we might regularly order shell casings from 1000 machine shops, each doing a couple, to make sure that each of them has experience doing it. The penny-pinchers won’t like that, low-volume production is expensive, military logisticians will love it.
And we can definitely produce more tank/artillery barrels than Russia, btw. They only have two suitable rotary forges, both of them Austrian models. That company could, push come to shove and with some help from other companies delivering parts, probably build forges faster than the Russians can make barrels. And at that point you seriously have to worry about whether we still have enough steel production to justify making cutlery.
I don’t think we even need to do that, 3% GDP would do it, and surpass the 9% GDP Russia allegedly is spending. ( about a third their government budget)
We can do it while maintaining a normal and sustainable economy, and Russia would crack like twig.
Absolutely.