AFTER REFURBISHMENT, UP TO 178 LEOPARD 1 TANKS COULD MAKE IT TO UKRAINE IN UNDETERMINED NUMBER OF MONTHS
Three European countries, Germany,Denmark, Norway, have announced that they may be able to get Ukraine as many as 178 Leopard 1 tanks. This makes for great news and no doubt this will fuel many interesting discussions on the virtues of the Leopards 1's vs T-72s etc, etc. But these kind of discussions miss the point. Getting Ukraine tanks is far more about getting the public to buy into and continue to support the pattern of escalation we have seen since entering the war on Ukraine's side to the point it could now be argued that the US and NATO are in a proxy war with Russia. A proxy war in which many U.S and NATO leaders are investing political capital and one in which the pride of those leaders is now fully and dangerously committed.
It is worth recalling when US and NATO began their support of Ukraine after Russia invaded it was going to be limited, and tanks were off the list of supplies Ukraine was going to get. Now the United States and NATO countries are rushing to get what could amount to be several hundred tanks to Ukraine over the next year or so. Though the timing does not line up, Ukraine defense officials are talking about employing the tanks in a massive counteroffensive to drive Russia out of the Donetsk/Donbas region. However, even if all the tanks delivered were M1-Abrams and/or Leopard 2's in prime working condition (they won't be) and they were delivered to Ukraine tomorrow (zero chance) they are not going to give Ukraine what it needs to drive Russia out of the heavily ethnically Russian areas of Donetsk and Donbas which are quite Russian friendly.
To win the war against Russian will require NATO/US troops and many more hundreds of billions of dollars of US aid and 100's of thousands more Ukrainian casualties, plus thousands of deaths of NATO/US soldiers. Putting enough troops and equipment in the field to actually defeat Russia will back Putin into the tactical nuclear weapon corner.
So, the likely outcome of all of this is in a year or two we will likely see some kind of peace agreement put in place that is very similar to what could be put in place today. The difference will be an even more devastated Ukraine in need of hundreds of billions of U.S. dollars to rebuild, and 100's of thousands more casualties, mostly young men.
We need to stop the escalation now and focus on the real threat to U.S. interests and security - China!
And why is it the United States that is providing by far and away the bulk of military supplies and money to Ukraine when the war is actually taking place in Europe?
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