Russia Must Be Denied the Weapons It Needs to Fight Ukraine

Eighteen months after launching what Russian President Vladimir Putin hoped would be a lightning-quick war of conquest against Ukraine, Russian forces remain bogged down in the forests and fields of eastern Ukraine.

Rather than replenish Russia’s treasury and arsenal with the spoils of war, Putin has drained it. 

The Toll on Russia

The country has likely lost 50,000 men, with perhaps three times that number wounded. The toll on Russia’s hardware has been equally devastating. Russia has lost more than 2,000 tanks, almost 1,000 armored fighting vehicles, more than 2,500 infantry fighting vehicles, and hundreds of artillery pieces. Ukrainian fighters have shot down or knocked out of commission more than 80 Russian jet fighters and nearly 100 helicopters, and sank or disabled more than a dozen naval ships, including the flagship of the Black Sea fleet. Today’s drone strike on a Russian naval base appears to have knocked an additional warship out of commission. 

The days of the Russian military ranking as the second most powerful are likely over; if it were not for Russia’s nuclear arsenal, it is increasingly unclear that Russia belongs among the top five.

Like a surgeon who has started an elective procedure only to have his patient start bleeding out, Russia is committed. To walk away would be a disaster. Rather, the war needs constant transfusions to keep not only the Russian military but also the regime itself alive.

Russia Courts North Korea for Weapons

During a visit to North Korea ostensibly to mark the 70th anniversary of the armistice that paused the Korean War, Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu reportedly requested the Soviet client and the world’s most isolated regime provide Russia with more ammunition. National Security Council Spokesman John Kirby quipped, “This is yet another example of how desperate Mr. Putin has become … He is going through a vast amount of inventory to try to subjugate Ukraine, and he’s reaching out to countries like North Korea, like Iran, and certainly he’s been trying to reach out to China to get support for his war machine.”

The Ukraine conflict has become an international proxy conflict, if not a world war, albeit one fought almost exclusively on Ukrainian soil by Ukrainians and Russians. Still, it is spin over substance to claim that the United States and its European allies are not involved, especially as they ensure a flow of weaponry to Ukrainian forces working to expel Russia from all Ukrainian territory.

If the White House is committed to Ukraine’s victory, it must do two things. First, it must provide without preconditions the weaponry Ukraine needs to win. Neither President Joe Biden, Secretary of State Antony Blinken, National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan, nor his chief deputy Jon Finer have served in the military; they must cease trying to micromanage Ukraine from 5,000 miles away.

Block the Flow

While Congress and Pentagon officials debate what weaponry they might provide Ukraine, there is a broader missing piece in U.S. strategy: Denial of weaponry to Russian forces. Any direct interceptions of weaponry from North Korea, China, or Iran is not feasible: Both North Korea and China border Russia, while Iran can transfer supplies by ship across the Caspian Sea or via Azerbaijan’s north-south corridor between Iran and Russia. There are other ways to prevent North Korea from providing ammunition, Iran from shipping drones, or China from providing armored fighting vehicles, however.

While Pyongyang, Tehran, and Beijing each wish to see Russia triumph over Ukraine, they also each put their own security ahead of Moscow’s. It is essential, therefore, to affect their own cost-benefit analysis to convince each country to keep its weaponry at home.

The response to Russian attempts to import North Korean ammunition should not be to finger wag or lecture, but rather to augment U.S. forces in South Korea and to deploy an additional U.S. carrier strike group or amphibious ready group to waters off the Korean Peninsula.

The Biden administration would be right to station U.S. Marines on commercial ships in the Persian Gulf, but as Iran’s military exports increase, it is essential to do more. Greater U.S. military presence near Iran’s shores and borders will give the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps reasons to ensure its stock of unmanned aerial vehicles remain accessible.

The same is true for China. While the open source intelligence on Chinese provision of weaponry to Russia is less certain, the White House presumably has clarity, especially as land border crossings and railheads capable of transporting such weaponry are limited.

A more aggressive U.S. posture in the region not only makes strategic sense for its own sake but also may cause some in the People’s Liberation Army to question the wisdom of sending equipment abroad.

There are certain difficulties: Arsenals are limited. Willpower matters. The United States might have industrial might on paper but for too long, the government has allowed competitors to outpace its military production. Absent a display of willpower, though, Russia’s allies will fill the gaps in its power and enable it to freeze and extend a conflict that today keeps Putin in power and risks broader regional security and the rules-based order.

If the goal is to allow the Russian patient to bleed out, it is time to end the transfusions.