Mike Kofman and Rob Lee on the West’s Aid to Ukraine, and the Debate Over Red Lines and Escalation

[Music] welcome back I'm Max Bergman director of the Stewart Center and Europe Russia Eurasia program at csis and I'm mariaa senior fellow for Russia and Eurasia and you're listening to Russian Roulette a podcast discussing all things Russia and Eurasia from the center for strategic International Studies [Music] [Applause] [Music] hello everyone and welcome back to Russian Roulette Maria and I are joined by two fantastic guests this morning Michael Kaufman and Rob Lee Mike is a senior fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for National peace and Rob is a senior fellow at the foreign policy Research Institute both have become I would say the top military analysts when it comes to the war in Ukraine and all things Russian military Mike also has an excellent podcast over at War on the Rocks the Russian contingency that everyone should check out so Mike and Rob to have you with us today thanks for having us today we plan on asking them about the current state of the war their understanding of Ukraine's recent KK offensive and also the debate regarding whether or not the West has been quote unquote self-determination to provide Ukraine with certain weapons and also to allow Ukraine to use those weapons on Russian soil but Mike and Rob maybe to start off you recently came out with a really excellent Foreign Affairs article titled Ukraine's gamble the risk and rewards of the offensive inter Russia's kers region we'll put put the link in the show notes but specifically we'd like to hear your thoughts on whether the move into KK has called the Kremlin Bluff when it comes to escalation dominance and whether the kremlin's lack of a response to an invasion of its own territory maybe exposes the West supposed red lines on Aid to Ukraine as as being misguided Ukraine has just invaded Russia and it seems like the Russian response has been been tepid at best Rob maybe we'll start out with you sure so I think we keep in mind that this is not the first incursion that Ukraine has conducted into Russian territory so there was a lot there was a large one in May 2023 right before the summer offensive where it was most units from Ukraine's defense intelligence that led that operation that went into Russia's belr region for about a month or so I think I think it lasted into June and then in some ways there's some similar responses right where a lot of the Russian telegram channels were also complaining were making kind of hyperbolic statements and that operation I think was it designed to kind of draw away Russia units from from the south from where Ukraine's offensive was going to focus and ultimately I think it was it was probably a decent economy Force mission where it was a small Ukrainian element it was certainly embarrassing for Russia but you know its overall impact of the war I think was probably not that that significant right the overall the this this Ukraine summer offensive was obviously was not successful Russia did not pull that many forces away and they eventually kind of push out those Ukrainian elements Ukrainian defense intelligence tried another operation in belr in March of 2024 that went did not go as successfully and it didn't have much in effect and I think it's you know you can only see so much open sources but it seemed as though it was it was somewhat of a Col operation so this one was different right this this operation is different in a number of ways instead of it being a operation led by Ukraine's defense intelligence with paramilitary groups with Special Operations groups this is first and foremost a Ukrainian Army operation led by General CI very clearly a CI kind of dominated and conceived operation the main element of the force was from Ukraine's Air Assault forces so several I think three Air Assault brigades took part as the main component of their force and from reporting it doesn't seem as though the ukra defense intelligence was even told about this operation and zalinsky mentioned that yesterday as mentioned reporting before this so it's it's not clear that not only did they not necessarily play an initial role in the operation I don't think they were necessarily told because it was it was so compartmentalized so it this this operation is quite different right it was obviously more ambitious the units involved are larger greater forces and resources are committed to it and it's clear you know they they are pursuing something more than just a small drawing way of Russian forces that you might do with a grade and we're still at a phase where we're trying to figure out exactly what Ukraine's lawter objectives are I think it's certainly possible that what began with certain objectives in mind has has changed as Russia's response became apparent and Ukraine's leadership said that one of the main purposes of operation was to draw away as many forces possible from denet from elsewhere in the front line to try and slow down Russian offensive operations there and we know that Russia has pulled some forces from a variety of regions but they they prioritize pulling from non priority places in Ukraine right so Zaria hon there's some from Kuan there's some from denet but it was often that they're pulling maybe a battalion at a time maybe UAV units so it seems a russan response is kind of an economy of force response and they haven't pulled everything away to to immediately address K and the question I think going forward is that may have affected what Ukraine's second third stage of operation was right maybe there was other things they were planning on doing but once Russia didn't move that many forces maybe they we we're kind of seeing a different operation that's kind of responded to that so A Long tangent there to get back to red lines I'm not sure there there are specific red lines this War I think that when Russia sees events they look at them they try to determine what is the Strategic impact of each event right I think they they judged on a Case by Cas basis so some of this comes to us Aid and USA decisions about what we provide I think it's important to keep in mind that the type of escalation risk that they're might be might be responses where Russia is not necess responding to Ukraine but they might be responding to us interests elsewhere right that might be providing weapons to people we don't want them to provide to and we know that Russia has a much closer relationship with Iran and now North Korea than they did before and it's it's kind of hard from my perspective to exactly say what all these are because I don't know all these regions that well I don't know all us interests that well and I'm sure Russia will try and find vulnerabilities that is I think one one of the escalation risk areas but again it comes back to looking at what kind of changes we want to make what effect that will have on the battlefield and then are the escalation risks worth it in terms of How likely they are to occur and how painful they would be for our interest and I'll be honest I I think it's quite difficult without having the inside information of what exactly these risks are because many cases Russia may try and Signal they're not happy about something they might do something but signal in a way that only our us intelligent Community can see right things that are not public that only our our government people can see and in in which case I can't analyze that or say how much a problem is so I do think escalation R are one of the the concerns the B Administration has about certain aid about whether or not to authorize attack and Strikes into Russia it's kind of hard to analyze without that other information about what are the trade-offs that might occur here may I build on that thank you very much Rob with a question to Mike Mike would be really interested in getting your perspective on that and specifically it appears to me that you can't really win a war against your opponent right if you only fight the war on your own territory without pushing into Russia's territory but it seems that the Western governments have been quite insistent since the start of the war that the war is kept within the Ukrainian borders and Ukraine as Rob pointed out has repeatedly tried to push through this boundary for this red line to what extent you think it's true and to what extent do you think Ukraine has exposed the Kremlin Bluff because as Max pointed out out like You' think if if anything was crossing the red line this would be the first invasion of Russia of the scale since the Nazi came in the second world war right and yet we don't see Russia responding so loudly even if R has flagged maybe something there's a lot that we don't hear and don't see being said and done publicly yeah it's an interesting argument I think the challenge is that it's not clear to me how much more Russia can actually escalate the war against Ukraine right they've not shown much in the way of constraint but that's not the issue being discussed the question is to what extent is the West a material party to the war which it is and how much Western countries supporting Ukraine want to be involved in attacks and in incursion of Russian territory and that's for everybody involved to decide I'll be honest to me the red lines conversation overall is a very low information discussion okay and I'll tell you why it's not a discussion that I participated in because in the past whenever I refer to it I've often Come Away actually learning less than what I thought prior to entering the conversation and here's my view on that subject first over the course of any War both the parties involved but especially when you have lots of external parties involved that are def fact backo material parties to the war they end up setting arbitrary thresholds and then they end up testing them and these thresholds may fall away leading to new ones being established there are no red lines is the wrong term what are these in fact are thresholds some are set by parties right they make claims in a form of declaratory policy and others are perceived meaning the parties involved perceive something to be a threshold and they might be wrong about that because there's no 100% way to know right you cannot sit in a decision Circles of another country and even then you don't know what the necessarily decide when of threshold is cross none of that's unusual right so rather than red lines we should think of these as more potential escalation thresholds that are arbitrarily set by parties right okay and of course everyone has an incentive to communicate thresholds in a war and to Bluff potentially to make claim to thresholds they have that probably are not real escalation thresholds for them right and over the course of this war United States and other countries have fairly consistently gone through thresholds that they perceived Russia had from the very outside of the war regarding provision of material assistance intelligence certain types of capabilities all the way through today that's been a fairly consistent Trend now I think it's also important to note that when we talk about these thresholds often there are times when policy makers don't want to do certain things for their own reasons and they hide behind the threat of escalation as one of the potential reasons whereas they have a series of other factors that they are managing maybe in domestic politics if in the case of Germany maybe other things that they don't want to do right the question of thresholds is one we're never going to get away from because arbitrary boundaries have to be set somewhere right somewhere between us provision of artillary ammunition and aircraft carriers to Ukraine there's going to be a line drawn and people will never believe either like or not like where that line is drawn but somewhere between provision of basic missiles and B2 Stell bombers the United States is going to say no not going to provide these things because they don't make sense I don't want to give them so on so forth some of the concerns are really about cost benefit United States has constraints in the number of capabilities it has and people I think often confus the US you doesn't want to provide certain capabilities because it's just not sure of the benefits relative to riness issues and people say hey the administration is hiding behind us right in practice that they're using this to hide behind yes or no so the Pentagon which is a place of Excel spreadsheets is one that kind of monitors their stocks closely and jealously and it's not always the case that the pocal leadership is just hiding behind these things sometimes it could well be that the defense department is using these spreadsheets to justify their reluctance to give certain things that they might be able to give but they don't want to okay that's fair but I'm just saying people need to understand that there are different incen was in a bureaucracy right and and they sort of they sort of imagine it as kind of just NC or just other folks trying to use these as excuses but actually it might not be an excuse it might well be the Pentagon just reluctant to give certain things that happens all the time I'm giving that as an example and that's got nothing to do with red lines or perception of thresholds it has to do with bureaucratic politics in a country with institutions right like that's that's just how things play out lastly so the issue of providing certain capabilities also comes down to weapons whose employ will have to involve direct Western support this intelligence support in their operations a lot of people do not understand this in year three of the war they still do not understand this that it would mean the United States and other countries in many cases being directly involved in targeting in planning and intelligence analysis what have you in support of strikes into Russia all right and that is maybe for some folks a non-issue or maybe a very minor thresholds to cross but it's not their call it's the call of people who are responsible for these decisions and the consequences of those actions we have to Grapple with them all right and what are their main concerns their main concerns from my point of view and I don't know any of this for a fact right I'm not Administration I wouldn't speak for it's not nuclear escalation this is why I say it's a very low information discussion that takes place in online circles right the first concern if there is any is horizontal escalation that Russians countering that and retaliating for it by transferring capabilities knowhow technology and specialized Personnel two countries like Yemen like the houthis to let's say enable targeting of major Maritime shipping that would be a problem not just for the United States but actually for pretty much everyone who likes to use that commercial route okay that would be an issue all right another one is the expanding Russian sabotage campaign in Europe and the trajectory could take which has been very notable over the past year right there could be concerns over future costs and actions Russia will take that are conventional or or principally asymmetric I hate that term because kind of everything's asymmetric but I think people appreciate what what I'm trying to say I mean it's not it's not sort of not sort of if the United States supports employing attack him strikes in Russia the Russia then going to start firing attack hims into a NATO country it's obviously not going to happen that's but that's why I'm trying to use that term to convey that there's other ways Russ can retaliate now anyone can argue hey this is already happening already and people should not be that worried about it and I'd say that's that's a perfectly Fair argument I am just trying to introduce information and trying to convey how policy makers think about these issues into what to me is like I said a fairly low information discussion at this point and from a c benefit perspective folks who want to decide to cross a threshold need to be convinced that the benefits are worth it and sometimes the folks who make that case I've made this case right like Rob and I are generally supporting in enabling expanding Ukraine's long range strike campaign we've been writing about it for a long time all right sometimes when you make that case you are not convincing relative to the costs the policy makers imagine the benefits that you are conveying don't appear sufficient to them right and folks forget that part of it too that sometimes it's not an issue of being deterred or being worried about escalation said you're just not doing a good job of selling them on the benefits and you need to do a better job of conveying to them the benefits of policy and maybe it's their fault that they don't get it and they don't see it but sometimes it's your fault because you're not doing a good job speaking for the facts yeah maybe we could unpack that a little bit both what are the military benefits of the US Unleashed Ukraine to kind of do whatever it wanted so to speak I mean I I sort of find myself in the camp that I think the US policy has sort of boiled the Frog effectively here in in escalating in injecting new technology new weapon systems without really getting into a real really dangerous escalation threshold and that we're actually in a very good place and it seems like a lot of the demands for pushing the boundaries I I start to get to where you are Mike I question maybe what are the military benefits you two are top military analysts are the real military benefits that could come if the US l loosened its its restrictions and some of Ukraine's ability to strike into Russian territory and if so what would those benefits be and Rob maybe go to you on that sure so the main conversation right now is regards attacks and Storm Shadow scalp missiles right and the reporting says that Storm Shadow Scout missiles even though they're made by Britain and France they have us components and so the US has a say and what how they're used and jasm has been mentioned more recently that us is going to provide them so a question about whether not jasm allowed to be used in russan territory too jasm is a missile often times employed by aircraft by fighterjet f16s yeah it's an air launch cruise missile too I think the the more important development providing jasms is that the quantities will be greater right so Ukraine will have great greater quantities it's not fully clear we know we know Ukraine fired a lot of Storm Shadow scalps last summer I'm not sure what the replenishment rate has been and it's also concerned with tacks because they fired a not insignificant number of tacks and it also is a question of at what point do we to reach up into the the constraint position right where the US has kind of given as as much as it's comfortable giving it could give more if there are sufficient benefits but maybe not because of these constraints so first off I think people a lot of discussions about weapon systems come down to the All or Nothing right where it'll have no effect or it will be decisive and will have a massive effect and it's always in between if the US allows attam strikes and storm shell strikes into Russian territory there will be military benefits right there will be benefits it will help Ukraine and it's important not to to downpy Steve B article recently in foreign affairs where he talked about it is not going to be decisive and I agree with that right it's it's not going if we allow attacks from Shadow strikes this is not going to win the war for Ukraine but it can support it and in reality we talk about how to support Ukraine there's never this one Silver Bullet where this one capability would change everything it's it's holistic it's about increasing Ukraine's capabilities in general and then how those capabilities come together comes down to strategy right tactics right in planning and of course if Ukraine has certain capabilities they can make certain plans based off those capabilities they don't have them they had that adjusts their plans as well right so a lot of Fes here so I guess some of the things they can't achieve I think we should be clear about this a lot of the Russian missile strikes on Ukraine would not be affected by Storm Shadow attacks the air launch cruise missiles are launched by streo bombers and they operate Beyond more than 300 kilometers from the the border with Ukraine right the most of the Glide bomb are dropped by Russian s34 bombers that no longer operate within 300 kilometers of the Border either so they operate at airfields they further away at this point they used to be closer but now push back so releasing storm shadows and attack thems will not be a full solution to either of those problems and obviously a lot of the other missiles that are fired are also from calibers are also farther away as well so the US needs I Western countries need a a broader plan to help Ukraine respond to these kind of issues right it's not going to solve those issues what it could help with so Russia has a number of logistics facilities across the border there's a 300 km version they attack them there's there's a 165 km version some of cluster Warheads some have unitary Warheads so they they're they're optimized for different targets one thing that would be beneficial is if you know right now the the mid-range attack thems that uses cluster Munitions Ukraine typically uses them to go after air defense systems in occupied areas at least right now so s200 systems s400s that's really been the priority for quite a long time and they do this with Dynamic targeting right they locate something and they'll strike it pretty quickly which attack thems are useful for that would be quite useful in Fork right that would be quite useful to degrade Russian air defense capabilities in that region which could allow other operations it would also be useful because a lot of Ukraine's long range strike campaign right is is conducted by Ukrainian produced weapons right drones we know they've got cruise missiles they know they have ballistic missile programs and so if you knocked out some of the air defense systems on the Russian border that could potentially make it easier for Ukraine to conduct longer range strikes into into Russia now the US may not want to be part of that right that might be that might be one of these factors but it would help another thing that's important is that when the US made the the policy change in May to allow strikes into Russia with himars the initial effect the really most important effect that we heard when we were there in June is that Russia launched a lot of s300 S400 air defense missiles as ground to ground missiles they had consistently struck Harkey with that once himars were allowed to strike into Russia they knocked out a couple s300 like you know the first day and after that there were no s300 S400 strikes on hary for at least a month at that point a few days ago there were a number of strikes in the harie and that was with s300 S400 so I think this is the first time possibly since that policy change at the beginning of June end of May attacks would be more effective attacks have longer range than high than gim for high Mars that would be one justification is to say we're trying to help protect civilians in har attack thems could be part of it right and again it maybe the way a change could could happen we've seen before the bid Administration the initial attacks we provided were the shorter range ones and then eventually went to the longer range ones where it's just kind of incremental steps the same thing could happen with strikes in Russia right we allowed High Mars G more strikes maybe you allowed the intermediate attack thems and so on so air defense would be useful look the cisk operation it looks like Ukraine is is is there to stay for a certain amount of time because zinsky has mentioned is a bargaining ship and that means that in order for this ship to be useful you have to hold that territory well allowing attack them strikes into Russia will make it easier for Ukraine to hold that area in K it's not going to solve everything but you can knock out two concentrations you can knock out kind of logistics other kind of facilities so there variety of ways that would be useful but you know again I don't think it will be decisive and it comes back to the risk reward and the kind of sense of escalation risk but it would be useful it would pose more problems for Russia and that's kind of one of the considerations here but I think the broader conversation and Mike and I talked about this at the end of the article Russia's strike campaign against Ukrainian infrastructure is a really significant problem right mostly article we kind of talk about what's happening k what's happening denet and most of the fighting is is at the Tactical operation level significance whereas the strikes in Ukrainian infrastructure are potentially strategically critical right it could lead to Ukraine losing maybe not losing the war but it could lead the situation to be much much worse for Ukraine I think the implications are greater so it's very important for for Ukraine supporters to come up the plan how can we compel Russia to stop these strikes these really damaging strikes against Ukraine and allowing Storm Shadow attack thems are not enough because the range is not great enough right so you know it's not going to affect everything and right now Ukraine is going after Russian energy infrastructure right we saw refineries now we're seeing power PLS with the uavs I assume that's going to continue all winter maybe it gets to a point where Russia decides you know what let's let's make an agreement we don't go after each other's energy infrastructure anymore because it's becoming painful for us but ultimately right Western countries need to come up with a plan for how do you help Ukraine here because it's a really significant issue and I think we talk about this shic role of long range strikes the one thing I would kind of disagree with B's argument here is that and and he didn't make this argument exactly so I don't want to make be unfair to it Ukraine's longrange strikes against Russian energy infrastructure it will not defeat Russia but if it makes Russia stop striking Ukrainian infrastructure then it could be strategically critical right because it help Ukraine sustain this war stay in the war and that could have important benefits on its own I think that's kind of way to frame it and of course look if there are concerns with NATO countries of providing attack thems and and conducting intelligence to help the strikes in Russia maybe there's a role of subsidizing Ukrainian produce missiles of that kind of capability instead right maybe that's that's the workaround I don't know But ultimately Ukraine when they look at the problems they're facing Russia's a bigger country they have more resources and they're they're able to mobilize and right at least currently get enough soldiers to to enlist and go fight Ukraine needs to respond in different ways right they need to F respond the ways to try and compel Russia in this war to try and raise costs and if Russian countries don't come up a plan themselves for this right then Ukraine's going to develop their own kind of internal capabilities and so I think that's the kind of discussion we need to have Mike curious anything to add to to Rob and Rob thanks for that I think that was really helpful yeah I think rob a lot of good points here i' add that I think the main challenge in our provision of military system has been that while we boiled the frog in terms of escalation thresholds it seems to have generally been at the cost of transferring capabilities out of sequence with combat operations such that their advantages when they were deployed could not be realized to have an operationally significant effect to put it in more simply terms basically whenever Ukraine has done offensive operations you would have wanted to have capabilities of providing Advantage provided to them at scale in advance of it so they could turn that Advantage into something that would be operationally relevant and decisive but often we have provided them in fairly small numbers and often after the actual operation so it come up basically a daily and a dollar short and that's probably the fairest criticism overall of of our approach agree with everything Rob said about Steve's argument which I think ended up being a bit of the best being the enemy of the useful right just because these capabilities cannot achieve the best does not mean that they cannot be useful and cannot attain things in in the Gory of limited aims I think that outside of of aircraft which Rob touched on Russia does have a lot of supporting military infrastructure Logistics and other things within range of Western strike abilities and it would force upon them a significant adjustment period that could sa momentum cause a degree of disorganization forcing them to reorganize the way they operate and that could certainly play to Ukraine's Advantage for a period of let's say a few months Rob touched on the ability of arch abilities to deg Great Russian air defense thereby expanding Ukraine's own drone strikes I think that's a better way to think about and look at it and compelling Russia to Halt let's try campaign against Ukraine critical infrastructure why because we are not going to find enough air defense in terms of both systems and Munitions to cover Ukrainian airspace and we're not going to be able to do it in a way such that Ukraine can defend and critical infrastructure such as energy its cities its people and its front line right it's not looking like that's going to happen especially with Russia's expanded strike capacity both in terms of numbers of Munitions that is the the the number of missiles that they are producing has grown year on year and sophistication in in how they're actually conducting the strikes and and the last point I would say is that an expanded strike campaign where Ukraine is pursuing now Russia at the very least from my point of view would be a much better use of these capabilities than the Crimea strike campaign that they had been running this year with Western support which in practice has not been setting the conditions for anything that is what is meant to follow this campaign right it seems to be it's a year after the actual offensive that was meant to get to Crimea and completely out of sequence with it and no offensive is likely to happen following the strike campaign either it's already led to significant adaptation by Russian forces in terms of interceptor Ates for attack thems sorry they're not marginal not by not by a long shot and Ukraine has used hundreds of air launch cruise missiles and I won't say how many but a fairly large number of attackin as well and if one is going to expend Munitions at this rate you would want to use them against something that's actually going to deliver real effects for you right so it be much better having an actual strike campaign I think against Russian critical infrastructure or against Russian air defense in Russia enabling Ukrainian drone strikes or trying to pursue limited aims such as a cessation to the Russian strike campaign itself I understood that the Crimea campaign is sort of a an end in and of itself degrading Russian air defense that is like hey it's a good op it'll do as an operation until a better one gets here but looking back on it it's also quite clear that ukrainians are not making much of it the K offensive is a pretty good indicator that the way they see their objectives and how they're trying to attain leverage over Russia is quite literally in a very different direction from the campaign we've been supported so on top of everything else there's also an congruence of goals it appears and tactics across the west and Ukraine on the numbers Michael you mentioned that one of the more legit criticisms would be the sheer number of those Weapons Systems that are being offered to Ukraine and this is something that we've heard repeatedly being mentioned by outside external nure analysts on our side we looked up some information on the internet this is fully open open information and just to give our audiences a sense how much is being provided as as opposed to how much the USS in stocks for example compiles information again feel free to correct me if I'm wrong about those numbers for example the US has roughly 370 High Mar systems and as of May 2024 had sent roughly 40 plus to Ukraine about 4,000 of Bradly fighting vehicles but again as of May it has sent only about 300 to Ukraine the discrepancies are much higher when it comes to for example Abram's tanks about 4,600 in stocks and only about 30 have been sent to Ukraine and when it comes to Patriots especially right there's more than 60 Patriot air defense batteries but at least only one that that has been sent to Ukraine how would you explain that so I understand that there might be differences in the ways say the different military planners Envision this campaign but once a decision has been made to offer something why so little is offered as opposed to as what appears how much the US has in stocks is it different priorities or is it being cautious about been flagged by our colleagues about how Ukraine was going to use it I've seen some analysis mentioning corruption in Ukraine and maybe those are the concerns but I think Ukraine just proven itself being quite capable of using those right in any case it would be really interesting to get a perspective Rob maybe we start with you sure I don't think corruption is the concern I don't think we we have any indications that there's been any Corruptions issues with Western provide weapons to Ukraine we have all examples of of Ukraine using them quite successfully including the ones you mentioned right the Patriots have performed very well Ukrainian air defense Crews have performed very well with Patriots they've shot down Ken jaws and other systems and very complex attacks I think actually Patriots have the reputation has gone up quite a bit in this war and I think that'll be a long kind of lasting effect of the war Bradley have performed very well too and everyone we talk in Ukraine every Brigade wants Bradley and the guys the 47 mechanized Brigade who receiv him first they only have great things to say about them because they're very survivable the weapon systems are very effective and they operate them very well so I think some of these systems of high Mars the limiting fact with highs is not the number number of launchers it's the number of missiles right it's the number of gims we have to provide because Ukraine has lost some high Mars I think we've replaced them I'm sure we could provide more but I think it's more a question of how many missiles can we provide them that they can fire each day and so I think that's the the greater limiting factor there with Patriots they need more Patriots right that's I think they they want several more than they have and one of the key issues that their ballistic missile defenses are not that strong in many places so in keev they have obviously a strong Patriot capability there in many of the Cities they don't have it they have very little ability to shoot down aanders to shoot down different ballistic missiles if Ron provides ballistic missiles that would be another issue so they can shoot down cruise missiles more effectively they can shoot down head drones pretty effectively ballistic missiles are much more difficult so that's providing Pates is a is a key capability that they need and Patriots also can engage bombers at long range so if you have more of them you can bring up Patriot batteries to try and engage Russians 234s to drop these Glide bombs right but of course it's a scarc the issue so Ukraine has pushed up some One patri battery was damaged was operating near P doing this kind of mission and of course is a trade-off between defending cities from these missiles and being able to try and knock down Glide bomber carriers at the front right so again the more Patriot they have the more ability they can pursue these different things but in large part Patriots it's also a an issue of how many interceptors they have right it's a missile issue and so they are still constrained that regard so yes more systems will be useful because then you can defend more more kind of targets more cities but it's also just a question of you know do they have enough missiles to engage all the Russian missiles and I think there always going to be a negative balance there we the systems look Ukraine needs more armored vehicles that's been a concern and issue for a long time where they're forming new brigades new brigades do not have enough armored vehicles even existing brigades right they they have very limited number and the types they have are are kind of more like Armored Cars not always infantry fighting Vehicles Ukraine loves m113s the armor of personnel care that we have in the US that we mostly pushed out they're very simple to operate they're very simple to maintain ukrainians really like them I'm a big fan of providing as many m113 as possible they also use them as as a caty evacuation vehicle which often when they don't have a armored vehicle for casual evacuation they sometimes don't evacuate soldiers who are wounded right they have to wait and so it's really important for a variety of things so m113 is great rallies are great my understanding is that we are providing a lot more of these so that that kind of information has gotten through we're ramping up our deliveries of this I don't know the exact numbers but I think we understand this important one thing ukra is doing with brow's now is that instead of having them all in one Brigade they're now sting these kind of separate battalions and what that means is there's a couple of assult battalions that theyve deliver them to what that means is you can you can move these battalions around the front line to maybe plug gaps with their problems right so instead of having one Brigade that has all these vehicles which really needs to stay in the front line at all times as a result now you have these different battalions that can do this and that might be a way of maintaining this Force more effectively but for other systems we also provide a good number of5 hoers there is it's a little difficult to say because I I know we have constraints and I know there are factors in US offensive plans where we want to have a certain number of things and of course if we get into a war of attrition and a war we fight in does not end very quickly we need to have large reserves of weapons too right that's been a key lesson of this war Russia's lost a huge number of Tanks lost huge of vehicles they are still fighting because they had massive stop piles of this and we are struggling some in some ways to make up for it because Ukraine ran through a lot of their initial capabilities until NATO started really filling in in 2022 so I think the mage has been has been heard I think our people understand this in some cases I think these are constraints that we just can't simply wish away fast enough in other cases look you know in 2022 if we had known this going to be a two and a half plus Year War there were Investments That should have been made right mostly that's an ammunition production capacity but also equipment right it' been great if we started producing more of certain equipment so these are some of the hindsight issues that didn't go the right way but certainly Western a is still critical for Ukraine and it is still a key determin when we talk about what is the worst trory it is looking at Russian stop piles looking at Russian production of vehicles every month and looking at what Western countries can provide and there is a question I think you guys may know this better than I do of we pass a large Aid package this year will there be another equally large Aid package next year the year after that going forward I've heard people that are pessimistic they don't think we're going to be able to continue doing that and if that's the case then that's going to affect the war for Ukraine and I obviously hopefully we can sustain providing this kind of aid for as long as Ukrainian needs it but I think that is that's a that I have yeah Mike I want to turn to you on that but I think part of the issue at least from from my perspective is that is one you have folks in the Pentagon that are focused on us War fighting Above All Else and so I think sometimes ukrainians want us to be on equal War fighting with them and that's just simply not the case our folks in the Pentagon are focused on on the Indo Pacific they're focused on China on r on the Middle East and looking our stockpiles and being like okay we're now hitting thresholds where we don't want to go below but the other issue is I think a funding one and I'm I'm curious for your take on this is that we've passed an aid package but that's not a blank check I mean it's really huge what we've done 60 billion it's sort of unprecedented what we've done I think in post World War II in providing this much conventional military aid to a country that were not at war with the combatant but there's real restrictions or limitations on what we can do just given how much funding there is and I'm curious from your perspective if am I overstating that and do you think the aid that we're providing is being spent wisely I mean I know Colin col when he was under Secretary of Defense even pointed to well you want f-16s but if we're going to provide f-16s then what aren't we going to provide because then that's going to eat into other money that we would provide maybe ammo or or Bradley's or whatever it is how do you see usaid is it foundational for Ukraine are we doing as much as we can is there more juice we can squeeze out of this lemon what's your sort of broader take on that and anything that Rob said as well Max it's a great question but I have to say here right up front that I'm not a a bing on person so this is very much an outsider's perspective and somebody listening to this from do might shudder at what I'm about to say next and that's okay DOD folks hide behind Readiness and and spreadsheets and things they say they can't show you and we're terribly sorry we can't do it we just don't have enough so we have so many not enough so we can have a go at them anyway without them here so first the eight package is large in numbers but it's funding that will mostly never leave the United States right only a small percentage that's really going go to Ukraine if you look at how that money is actually spent second there's L of your crack politics involved so DOD is quite Adept at getting reimbursed for equipment they are providing at far above the actual value of that equipment and you see a lot of services taking used equipment from the global war on terror you remember this time period of our history you know some of it that's probably been ridden hard and put away wet or what have you and sliding it into presidential draw down Authority and then giving it to Ukraine because you see ukrainians running offensives and Max Pros various types of mraps up armored V right like m113 sort of the latest and greatest of what the United States had during both the Cold War and during the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan what do you think the Kelly Blue Book value of these items is okay right now if if we kind of Imagine though what the Pentagon is probably charging for them as the replacement value and why the Pentagon regularly comes up with sudden accounting errors where they've discovered an extra $2 billion that they didn't have because somebody looked at the Excel sprad sheeet and just started deleting zeros off the valuation to come up with more funding just on this There Was You know the the previous supplemental they were running out of money and suddenly the Pentagon found six billion what happened was they just like one branch I fig out which one wasn't depreciating the actual value of the stuff that they were providing so they squeezed more more juice out of out of that supplemental yeah it works both ways when they're then right buying stuff too right it's it's an amazing over side that they suddenly rectified and the point I'm going with us is that not not that it's all sort of magical numbers but that Pentagon accounting for things that don't have an actual market value gets pretty creative okay so one reason is that I think services are definitely looking for ways in which they can give away the soldier equipment while still getting money as reimbursement well above the value what they're giving that's and I see that bureaucratic politics I also see that the defense department like other defense departments in Western countries they don't want to give away high-end low availability weapons and systems right and part of the reason for that particularly for us is this a real world example to folks who say you can just give security guarantees to everyone and those commitments won't impose constraints they will because the US has operational plans that come with requirements and so you end up sudden getting pinned down by requirements for all sorts of operational plans you have for real world commitments and other people you promis to defend and those and you can you can counter argue and say these requirements are too high but as you know in the world of cocoms combat and commands those that's where the real fight is those folks are going to argue for their requirements and and things allocate to their operational plans and and so anything you want to take when it comes to Pion systems like Patriots you are taking them from someone F folks on follows they imagine that they kind of live they live on some base there's a patriot base full of Patriots but that's not the case right what's actually happening is they're either deployed or they're allocated to be deployed to a cocom in the event they of a contingency and the plan and they're assigned to that plan and those people are depending on that system to be there and even though the United States may have 60 I assure you all 60 of however many there are are spoken for by somebody right and so you have to make a call to pull them from somebody and say okay well that's just the political decision to be made sure yes but there's a lot of night fighting involved in these things and for for these kind of capabilities including am Munitions which Rob touched on there's a big production backlog the production backlog for Patriot missile is something like seven years that's why this year they suspend the exports until to divert supplies to Ukraine until we're able to fulfill Ukrainian needs because there's there's no other way that's going to come with expensive orders for other countries like somebody's in that seven-year purchase order Pipeline and so they're going to get theirs later yeah the last part I was going to say is that when we turn to Nato so so our European allies are good at many things but buying ammunition has never been one of them and having large capacities in defense capabilities is also not been one of them either and having given away a whole bunch of these things to Ukraine in the last two and a half years to support Ukraine rightfully they're also focusing on rearmament but now they're concerned about how much they have left versus what they've given right that's issue one issue two looking at the US election particularly this year max they're a bit unsure about us future commitments and what they can count on and that has right a suppressing effect if you're not sure who's going to win the election and you don't know what the future of the US role in Europe is going to be you might be a bit hesitant about how much more you're going to give until you have a sense of what your security environment looks like moving forward and no and I think people will not necessarily say that but I get the sense that that that's out there as a background context for some of the discussions and decisions being made and in general I observe a pretty large rhetoric to investment Gap in this war particularly in the third year of it amongst Western countries I think that's the fairest way to summarize it fascinating discussion thank you so much I wanted one quick follow-up question which always puzzles me wouldn't a war in some ways be beneficial for the US military industrial production the same way that it is beneficial for Russia meaning that there's an opportunity to now boost this money and ideally also back up perhaps Sol some political issues because again correct me if I'm wrong but maybe some of the defense Industries are based in Rasel regions so maybe few more people get employed is that a naive way of looking at things why is there so much resistance domestically at essentially offering more Aid to Ukraine while it seems on on Surface to be good potentially for the US economy but that's not at all what's happening Rob m whoever would like to comment yeah without going down the sort of standard Trope of Wars defense industrial policy and all this that and the other yeah in general this war had led the United States to issue multi-year contracts to increase ammunition production to build new plants which we should have done anyway what it did is it actually revealed something that many many folks had seen But the political will had not been there to actually drive change which is we are not we are are not prepared for a great power War we are not prepared for prolonged conventional War attrition against a principal competitor like China we've been talking about it we've been planning for it but if you look at our stocks you you look at our ammunition production rate if you look at where we are in terms of Defense industrial capacity we're not there why we reap the peace dividend and the benefit of being a dominant superpower for many decades right and so we're both short on mobilization capacity the production capacity matches the need right because efficient and meaning there's not a lot of slack in the system and and so not to be GL about it but modern weapons are complex you can't ramp them up that fast hell we struggle to ramp up production of artillery shells can you imagine what it takes to ramp up production of interceptors for Patriot batteries right so so some of these things you can no longer Whittle them out that quickly compared to the way you might have been able to ramp up production of w of weapon systems 50 70 years ago so yeah it I mean of course politically it should be one of the easiest things to sell which is most of the money stays in the United States it never leaves the US it doesn't go to Ukraine the corruption concerns are grossly overblown not only because they are but also because we're actually not giving Ukraine much money at all people unfortunately have the wrong impression after many years or Decades of seeing the United States giving suitcases of cash to people in Iraq and Afghanistan and I don't blame the public and I don't blame folks in Congress for asking these questions given how certain wars were run yeah and how then those people just left with those suitcases of cash at the end that's like a fair that's you know that's still fresh in the memory of some people but but this is not that war yeah it would be beneficial for that it be naughty and even St Maria could even be beneficial for think tanks who receive significant levels of funding from us defense contractors we don't I mean I think one thing that has been a big surprise in this conflict is this I I think especially the folks in the White House is how unprepared our defense industry has been to ramp up production for a great power war and how our stocks aren't as as deep as as we had perceived and then how slow we are and actually producing things and shortages of things like gunpowder and other things like that maybe to final question looking forward with the K offensive also the state of the Russian defense industry which is ramping up but also experiencing some problems how do you see the balance of this war playing out over the over maybe the next year here just assuming a steady state and US support nothing really changes in terms of you know maybe there's another supplemental but basically we're doing what we've been doing Europe's been doing what what it's been doing maybe doing a little bit more is the tide running against Ukraine how do you kind of see the direction of travel right now sure I'll jump on that one it's funny because this podcast supposed to be about curse we didn't really talk about curse that much but Sidetrack we bring it back now Rob yeah I mean so so look the overall situation Mike I were there in June we came back we were more optimistic because ultimately Russia had number advantages this year and if we go back Ukraine summer fensive last summer failed and it ended when they ran out of infantry they suffered too much attrition that was the principal reason why it ended and ever since the Ukraine has had a deficit of Manpower it's been the biggest issue right it also was an issue when the US did not pay pass the a package but that became a problem too but Manpower is really the more significant issue and Ukraine has addressed these things they also addressed fortifications and when they passed the new mobilization bill April went to effect in mbay and they significant increased the number of soldiers they were mobilizing and getting for volunteers at every month right so since miday the numbers have increased dramatically and what that meant was Russia had this Manpower Advantage the last year where they've been getting 25 30,000 guys a month Ukraine is now getting 30,000 people a month and so that that was a way of of ideally over time if you suay these recruitment rate then every month you Ukraine brigades will get filled up they'll be better off and so our argument was basically we thought Russia's offensive potential would start to degrade this fall into winter and then Cur kind of it created a lot of unpredictability here because it's a bit is a risky operation it may pay off but it may not and if it doesn't pay off Russia might have made more gains than it would have otherwise so our view before this is that this fall this winter Russian offense potential will degrade they're running through armored vehicles at an unsustainable rate that Manpower issues will grow and then if Ukraine continued to just attrit Russian forces maintain a favorable attrition ratio things would get better because we know that our ammunition production capacity is increasing we're not going to achieve parity with Russia and our ammunition but if we reduce that rate right that could have a significant effect on battlefields and so if on one hand our defense industry catches up and Ukraine is able to stain a higher rate of mobilization and Manpower the situation should improve right and that would give Ukraine options 2025 to do offensive to do other kind of things there's greater unpredictability now with K because KK instead of sending all these soldiers to brigades on the front line and put Kos elsewhere many of them went to K instead many went to kind of new brigades and it's it's a question of kind of resource allocation so it's a it's a little more unpredictable about exactly how things will play out I think that Russia's offensive will probably last a longer now right this summer and going into the fall just because if Ukraine holds this area in k then other areas are going to be more exposed for a little longer so that creates kind of a question here and of course look you know if they hold curse long term then if if we get to the point where there's negotiations maybe it's a good negotiating ship it also kind of makes it more difficult for anyone to force negotiations on Ukraine whether it's allies or or anyone else because you can't just end the war with the current front line because Ukraine holds Russian territory right so so it it gives Ukraine greater leverage overall though I think we we thought the situation would likely improve in 2025 and I think it still will right I think it'll probably improve this fall but again you know that also depends on how does Ukraine make it through this winter with it its energy infrastructure right how does that go and and that's a bit of an open question and of course it depends on both sides how well they can mobilize resources how well they use resources one thing we've seen throughout this war is I think we've both seen both sides a lot of times military operations are dictated by political considerations and including short-term political considerations that are all not always helpful militarily and that sometimes creates problems and it also kind of influences how the war goes so you know what have to wait and see the curse operation was surprising right so is certainly possible we'll see other surprising events going forward that could significantly ffect the outcome of the war I think the resource situation it looks better for Ukraine in 2025 than it did in 2024 but how that exactly plays out is an open question Mike over to you closing thoughts I mean I think Rob pretty much nailed it he and I I wouldn't say are one mind but we have shared similar experiences where I'm at right now is I think we really have to see how the next several weeks play out one of the big questions I have is both Russia and Ukraine at this point face to some extent The Dilemma right Ukraine can try to expand the curse Salient and see if it can divert a much larger share of Russian forces to get the reaction they wanted and maybe use that to set set up something else some some other operation however to do that Ukraine risk overextension and undermining parts of the front and danet and takes on greater risk right the more territory they try to hold the more resources they have to commit to it the greater the potential tradeoff with defending and denet and the greater the potential risk that they will be stuck there holding this larger piece of terrain and still not get the kind of Russian response they want right Russia also some extent faces The Dilemma which is that they can continue focusing on the current offensives from bodar to pakr and P to tet and chadar and so on so forth as Rob discuss but if they focus on that and they choose not to counter in any significant way the Ukrainian persan curse then first they take the risk that Ukraine will widen theel and take over more territory and will become worse more embarrassing and secondly Ukraine will have time to further dig trench right so if they don't Mount the Counterattack it'll be harder to displace Ukraine out of curse and Ukraine could be holding this Cur Alan well into next year which is clear what they intend to do so both sides face to some extent of dilemma and choices that they have to make and they often har on the fact that the end of the day military strategy is about choices and tradeoffs usually most relator what you choose not to do and and so we're seeing a degree of of decision points for for both Ukraine and Russians to how they want to move forward I I think Rob and I together were we probably a bit skeptical that curse can really change things on the one hand on the other hand it's sort of worth a shot and it's it's it's quite interesting to see what it can do for Ukraine and where it can go I think a lot also depends in our judgment as to how it affects Ukraine's ability to defend the prros and how that plays out and I think that'll be the Judgment of most other folks if there is a operational significant Breakthrough by Russian forces if the front in denet isn't stabilized in the coming months right folks may make a logical linkage which I think does exist to some extent it may be enough for one but but there is a causal connection between K as a potential tradeoff with forr right so that's why I said it just depend depends on how those things play out unfortunately we don't know the details of what's happening at the front and we haven't been there in almost two months I would say yeah two months or so so so that's hard to say and lastly Ukrainian planning remains for lack of a better word emergent right and that's kind of where Ukraine tends to operate in terms of planning I've noticed a lot that tends to be Bard their space and so it's you can't really necessarily predict what what they will do next just as we did not predict the C offensive to begin with on August 6 Max when you ask us how do you think the war is going to go the next 6 months my answer is uh it's not that easy to necess predict what the next action is that Ukraine will take or that Russia will take and that's why that's why I I hedge a bit I hedge a bit seeing the curse offensive understanding that I don't that we don't necessarily know what's gonna follow even next month war is contingent and there's a podcast for that Rob thanks so much for joining Maria and I on Russian Ro it's been a real pleasure but unfortunately we're going to have to end it there massive thanks to both of you and of course our listeners for tuning in as usual if you haven't already please subscribe to our show and give us a festar rating additionally please be sure to check out our sister podcast the Euro file wherever you get your podcast and we'll see you next [Music] time you've been listening to Russian Roulette we hope you enjoyed this episode and tune in again soon Russian Roulette releases new episodes every 2 weeks on Thursdays and is available wherever you get your podcast so please subscribe and share our episodes online and be sure to check out all the latest analysis by the Europe Russia and Eurasia program at css.org [Music] [Applause]