Wars Use Lots of Shells
In modern war - a real war, not an American overseas adventure war - basic things like artillery shells matter. And their consumption can tell us a lot about how that war is progressing.
It was quite surprising to see the news blurb shown above from The Kyiv Independent. The publication is very definitely pro-Ukraine so I don’t see any reason to think they’re lying.
Ukraine was originally equipped with Soviet artillery and the standard calibers are 152 mm and 122 mm (it’s the same artillery the Russians use). They’re almost a year into the war and apparently just started production of artillery shells. Did they expect the war to end in a quick, easy victory?
Given how close the Ukrainian military came to disaster in 2015 (see previous article), it seems very unlikely the failure to start shell production is simply the result of arrogance. A few other possibilities come to mind, none of them especially positive:
They assumed the U.S. and NATO would intervene early in the war and force the Russians to back down.
They assumed the U.S. and NATO would supply whatever they needed to carry out a successful war by proxy.
They were discouraged from ramping up production so NATO stocks would be depleted, resulting in large orders to western arms manufacturers.
We may be looking at options two and three at the same time, as the American Department of Defense has announced they’ve tripled their normal order for large caliber shells after sending a million shells to Ukraine. But that increase won’t be anywhere close to enough, as we’re about to see.
Like the former Soviet nations, NATO countries are standardized and they all use the same shells - the most common artillery1 caliber is 155 mm. So far the U.S. had supplied at least 140 M777 towed howitzers to Ukraine, and per The New York Times Ukraine has received about 350 western made howitzers total (although it’s not clear from whom all these were received).
But they’re useless without shells, and wars with countries that have modern economies use a lot of them.
How important is artillery in modern war?
The power of enormous artillery barrages was demonstrated in both World Wars, with millions of shells being fired by each side.
World War I
According to Medicine in World War I from the Yale online library, artillery fire caused the majority of all casualties.
In his book Trench: A History of Trench Warfare on the Western Front (2010), Stephen Bull concluded that in the western front, artillery was the biggest killer, responsible for “two-thirds of all deaths and injuries.” Of this total, perhaps a third resulted in death, two-thirds in injuries. (Yale)
How many shells did it take to produce these casualties? About 1.5 billion were produced during WWI.
In Germany, shell production of all calibers increased from 343,000 a month in 1914 to 11,000,000 a month in 1918… From 1914 to 1918, Germany and Austria-Hungary produced up to 680 million shells and the industries of the Allies France, Britain, Russia (to October 1917), Italy, the U.S. and Canada, produced up to 790 million shells (the statistics vary greatly). (Scientific American)
11,000,000 per month is a mind-boggling number - the Germans had to be firing hundreds of thousands per day at some point. Based on these numbers, by 1918 production of all countries combined must have reached a million shells per day.
World War II
Data from the next World War is similar, with artillery accounting for about 2/3 of casualties. From a more formal report on casualties in two U.S. armies deployed in the war (my highlighting):
1. Small arms fire accounted for between 14 and 31 percent of the total casualties, depending upon the theater of action: The Mediterranean theater, 14.0 percent; the European theater, 23.4 percent; and the Pacific theaters, 30.7 percent.
2. Artillery and mortar fire together accounted for 65 percent of the total casualties in the European and Mediterranean theaters, 64.0 and 69.1, respectively. In the Pacific, they accounted for 47.0 percent.
(Enemy Ordnance Materiel, Beyer et al.)
The Pacific Theater involved a lot of fighting in the jungle where artillery is less effective, and the Japanese military placed much less emphasis on artillery than the European powers did. But it still accounted for half of U.S. casualties in that theater.
The point of all this should be very clear. In modern war:
Artillery is king, accounting for most casualties.
Shell consumption isn’t measured in thousands, it’s measured in millions.
Propaganda vs. Reality
In the previous article we read part of Douglas Macgregor’s take on the war, and now it’s time to look at his sober assessment of the current situation. Despite all the hype in western media things aren’t going that well for the Ukrainians.
In an interview published in the Economist, head of Ukraine’s armed forces General Valery Zaluzhny admitted that Russian mobilization and tactics are working. He even hinted that Ukrainian forces might be unable to withstand the coming Russian onslaught. (Macgregor)
The Russians have called up several hundred thousand already-trained reservists (similar to the American National Guard) and are clearly planning another big offensive.
He went on to insist that with 300 new tanks, 600 to 700 new infantry fighting vehicles, and 500 new Howitzers, he could still win the war with Russia. Truthfully, General Zaluzhny is not asking for assistance, he’s asking for a new army. (Macgregor)
This is not an exaggeration by Macgregor. The German army, for example, keeps fewer than 300 Leopard 2 tanks (the combat equivalent of the American M1 Abrams but much less fuel-thirsty) and they have nowhere near 500 howitzers. Many other NATO countries are even less well supplied - for example Austria maintains about 50 Leopard 2 tanks and about 50 self-propelled 155 mm howitzers.
The Zaluzhny Interview
Obviously the head of the armed forces of Ukraine should be upbeat about their progress in the war, but in the Economist interview Macgregor mentions, General Zaluzhny’s description of his own troops doesn’t engender much optimism.
Our troops are all tied up in battles now, they are bleeding. They are bleeding and are being held together solely by courage, heroism and the ability of their commanders to keep the situation under control. (The Economist)
And for all those who have been deluged with Ukrainian propaganda about the quality of their air defense systems, here’s some sobering news. Despite their reporting many successful missile interceptions, the Ukrainian’s power grid is getting destroyed.
Now we have a ratio of 0.76. Russians are using this 0.76 coefficient of efficacy when they plan their attacks. This means that instead of 76 missiles, they launch 100. And 24 get through and reach their target. And what do two missiles do to a power station? It won’t work for two years. So it has to be built up. (The Economist)
It really doesn’t matter whether we believe the rate of missile interceptions or not. In the end, the Russians appear to have the resources they need to destroy the energy infrastructure of the country.
Zaluzhny understands the level of materiel support necessary to win, but he also realizes it’s just not available. The British are discussing giving Ukraine a paltry 50,000 shells.
We are talking about the scale of World War One…that is what Antony Radakin [Britain’s top soldier] told me. When I told him that the British Army fired a million shells in World War One, I was told, “We will lose Europe. We will have nothing to live on if you fire that many shells.” When they say, “You get 50,000 shells”, the people who count the money faint. The biggest problem is that they really don’t have it. (The Economist)
The comment about “we will lose Europe” is very interesting - we should probably assume someone was using a bit of hyperbole. Or is Radakin suggesting that if Ukraine doesn’t stop Russia, the rest of NATO Europe isn’t up to the task? If so, what’s keeping the Ukrainians alive at this point? (Hint: American arms shipments)
And why aren’t other NATO countries able to carry more of the burden of supplying Ukraine? The answer to that question is simple - the European partners in NATO have simply not been keeping their defense spending commitments. Here’s CNBC reporting in 2018:
NATO collects defense expenditure data from each member’s defense ministry. The latest data from the organization, released Tuesday, estimated that for 2018 the U.S. will spend 3.5 percent of GDP on defense, while NATO Europe and Canada are expected to both spend 1.47 percent. (CNBC)
And lots of European expenditures are for American style high-end systems that are very costly but also very unreliable (more on that in another article, where we’ll look at things like the German Puma infantry fighting vehicle which is a complete disaster). Russia, on the other hand, spends a similar percentage of its GDP as America.
Russia increased its military expenditure by 2.9 per cent in 2021, to $65.9 billion, at a time when it was building up its forces along the Ukrainian border. This was the third consecutive year of growth and Russia’s military spending reached 4.1 per cent of GDP in 2021. (Stockholm International Peace Research Institute)
The Russian love buying things like huge piles of cheap artillery shells and Iranian suicide drones. “Quantity has a quality all its own” is an old military adage2 and we’re seeing the net effect of massive quantities of artillery right now.
What about all the stuff America sent to Ukraine?
According to reports both American and NATO stocks of artillery shells are very low. Here’s The Wall Street Journal in an article discussing comments by French President Macron about the need to reduce reliance on the U.S.:
Delivering heavy artillery in large volumes for a conflict with no end in sight is a costly endeavor. The U.S., France and Germany are under pressure for new production after depleting their own stocks of weaponry. (WSJ)
“Depleting” implies they don’t have any left, which is almost certainly untrue. If other nations have followed the lead of the U.S., they may have sent a third of their total stocks (which, except for the U.S., were very small to begin with). Can new production help? The normal output isn’t very much.
U.S. Secretary of the Army Christine Wormuth reported that the U.S. defense industry can currently produce about 14,000 155-mm howitzer shells per month, although manufacturing is planned to expand in the coming months. (New Voice of Ukraine)
That’s not much 155 mm ammunition at all. What about the former Soviet-aligned countries? They’ve exhausted their supplies of 152 mm shells and are discussing re-opening old factories.
U.S. newspaper The New York Times earlier reported that smaller NATO member states have already exhausted their potential to supply arms to Ukraine. According to the article, NATO countries are discussing investments in old factories in the Czech Republic, Slovakia, and Bulgaria to resume production of 152-mm shells for Ukraine’s remaining Soviet-era artillery systems. (New Voice of Ukraine)
Rather than swapping Victor Bout back to the Russians for a basketball player, perhaps the Americans should have paid him to source munitions. Instead the U.S. will increase output of shells and missiles for HIMARS systems.
“We are seeking over a couple of years to nearly triple our production of 155 [mm shells],” Bush said on Wednesday. Congress has been supportive; we have funding; we are executing and making that happen. We are also, through support from Congress, working to dramatically increase our production rate for GLMRS missiles – Guided MLRS [Multiple Launch Rocket System], HIMARS [High Mobility Artillery Rocket Systems] launchers – in most cases doubling or more than doubling current production rates.” (taskandpurpose.com)
Current U.S. production is reported as 14,000 per month, so tripling output will bring the total to a little over 40,000 per month - and per the article it will take years to see this increase. How many are the Ukrainians using?
The fighting has become so intense that Oleksandr V. Danylyuk, an adviser to the Ukrainian government, told the Washington Post in June that Ukrainian forces were firing between 5,000 and 6,000 artillery rounds per day. He also said the Russians were firing up to 50,000 rounds per day. (taskandpurpose.com)
If the Ukrainians are firing 5,000-6,000 shells per day this means they use 150,000-180,000 per month. Even the planned increase in U.S. production would only meet a fourth of this need. And note the Russians are sometimes firing 50,000 per day. This is actually believable since they are sitting on old Soviet stockpiles of many millions of shells.
What about existing American stockpiles? The number sent to Ukraine keeps increasing, and at least a million shells have been sent so far (some reports state up to 1.5 million).
That’s close to 1 million shells in roughly six months, and that figure does not include the precision-guided rockets for the 16 M142 High Mobility Artillery Rocket Systems, or HIMARS, that the U.S. military has also given to Ukraine. (taskandpurpose.com)
The quantity and time frame tell us something important. If the U.S. has sent the Ukrainians 1,000,000 shells and those were used up in six months (180 days) then they were firing about 5,500 per day. Remember that estimate of 5-6,000 shells per day of usage? Now we know where that number came from. The Ukrainian military has been completely dependent on American supply of shells. Without U.S. support, they’re done.
As of June, Ukrainian forces were firing up to 6,000 shells a day, prompting the Defense Department to provide the Ukrainians with the HIMARS as well as more precise 155mm rounds in an attempt to slow the rate at which the Ukraine was burning through its ammunition. (taskandpurpose.com)
That reference to “more precise 155mm rounds” almost certainly means the Excalibur shell, a GPS and inertial3 guided shell that’s very precise compared to unguided rounds.
The U.S. military has used these to great effect in the middle east, where pinpoint strikes were used to destroy targets while limiting the risk to nearby American troops. But these shells also cost in the neighborhood of $100k each - much too expensive for massed barrages against prepared Russian positions. The U.S. military normally buys only a few hundred or a few thousand per year, not 150,000 (what had been planned for standard shells) or a million.
The guns are also wearing out
America has some great stuff, no doubt about it. The M777 is a 155 mm artillery piece that’s light enough to be easily (and therefore quickly) transportable, which can be a very big deal in a fast moving military operation. But there’s a downside to making something very, very light.
Ukrainian troops fire thousands of explosive shells at Russian targets every day, using high-tech cannons supplied by the United States and its allies. But those weapons are burning out after months of overuse, or being damaged or destroyed in combat, and dozens have been taken off the battlefield for repairs, according to U.S. and Ukrainian officials.
A third of the roughly 350 Western-made howitzers donated to Kyiv are out of action at any given time, according to U.S. defense officials and others familiar with Ukraine’s defense needs. (The New York Times)
What happens when barrels get worn out? The pressure generated by the propellant leaks past the shell, making the range less predictable. The wear also means a loss in absolute accuracy as the trajectory of each shell has greater error.
Currently, Ukrainian forces are firing 2,000 to 4,000 artillery shells a day, a number frequently outmatched by the Russians. Over time, that pace has caused problems for Ukrainian soldiers using M777 howitzers, such as shells not traveling as far or as accurately. (The New York Times)
Inaccurate shellfire is much less effective over the long ranges of artillery duels. The M777 is far from the only example of a high-tech but very delicate weapon system in the U.S. arsenal, and we’ll look more into that subject later.
The U.S. military is great at small, contained conflicts in distant countries where they control the air and the sea. They’re organized in large part around things like COIN (COunterINsurgency) operations, not fighting near-peer adversaries.
But the war in Ukraine is old-fashioned war with two large economies hammering away at each other. This is the kind of war the Soviets were always preparing for, and the Russians are very good at.
Benjamin Franklin’s disapproving gaze
Over at National Defense they’re big cheer leaders for the current war but are much less sanguine about America’s ability to engage in a wider conflict.
Behind this operational success lies an uncomfortable reality: the war in Ukraine has left U.S. defense stockpiles significantly depleted. Current inventories do not undergird a national security strategy that continues to support Ukraine while retaining the ability to assist Taiwan in the event of a Chinese invasion. (National Defense)
If you invested early in defense stocks, this war is a huge boon. Many weapons manufacturers will now be operating at peak capacity to replenish American stockpiles, and these weapons are being ordered without competitive contract pricing.
A bipartisan group of senators recently introduced the Securing American ARMS Act, legislation that would allow the Defense Department to replenish depleted stockpiles through the award of noncompetitive contracts to defense industry members. Although noncompetitive procurement practices should not become the norm, this will allow for the backfilling of stockpiles without a lengthy procurement process. (National Defense)
When we’re not at war, the industry makes money by convincing the Pentagon to buy into ridiculously expensive, exotic weapon systems that spend more time in maintenance than in use (see Letter to the Pentagon and The Pentagon’s New Toy).
An actual war provides different opportunities - this time for no-bid, noncompetitive contracts in which the manufacturers are guaranteed large profits. Dan Grazier, who works for the Project On Government Oversight, summed up the conundrum of preparing for modern warfare very succinctly.
“Ever since I’ve been working on defense policy, all I’ve been hearing about is transformation of warfare, revolution in military affairs, the need to invest in AI. Then a big war kicks off and we’re taking about artillery rounds,” Dan Grazier, a defense policy fellow at the Project on Government Oversight, told Grid. “Look, 155-milimeter artillery rounds aren’t sexy. The money is in developing the next new thing.” (Grid)
But either way, someone always gets rich from the business of war.
If you would like to read more, click here for an index of all articles about the war in Ukraine:
If you would like to encourage more of my babbling, subscribe here:
Sometimes referred to as “tube artillery” to distinguish it from rocket artillery, which is also often categorized by the diameter of the projectile in millimeters.
Often attributed to Josef Stalin but this is probably wrong.
Inertial guidance means the use of sensors and a computer to calculate location based on speed and time in flight. Although not nearly as accurate as GPS, inertial guidance is obviously immune to jamming or other interference.