The possibility of sending combat planes to Ukraine will be part of the discussions that the defense ministers of the 30 NATO countries will hold in Brussels tomorrow and the day after, but it is not the most urgent thing that Kyiv needs right now to defend itself against Russian aggression. its secretary general, Jens Stoltenberg, warned today. "We are in a logistics race. Critical capabilities, such as ammunition, fuel or spare parts, must arrive in Ukraine before Russia seizes the initiative on the battlefield. Speed will save lives. If Putin wins Ukraine, the The reading that he and other authoritarian regimes will make is that the use of force pays off. The world will be more dangerous and it will make us all more vulnerable," he said.
With one year to go since the start of the war, Stoltenberg has defended NATO's decision to help Ukraine defend its sovereignty and territorial integrity and has stressed that the organization will support the country for as long as it takes "to achieve a just and sustainable peace". The allied leader has not ruled out that, when a negotiated solution to the conflict is reached, the allied countries can give security guarantees to Kyiv. But for now, he has said, "President Putin is not preparing for peace, he is launching new offensives", "sending more troops, more weapons", hence the urgency because the aid promised by the allies to the Ukrainian president, Volodimir Zelensky, materialize as soon as possible. "The most important thing is that help arrives quickly" and "make sure that what has been sent works as it should."
Before the meeting of defense ministers begins, a meeting of the Contact Group for the Defense of Ukraine in the 'Ramstein' format will take place in Brussels, at the same NATO headquarters, a forum in which it is expected that all countries specify, among other matters, what type of combat tanks they are going to send to Ukraine and what delivery and training schedules they handle. Spain is one of the countries that, to date, has not provided figures, but Defense Minister Margarita Robles is expected to make an announcement in this regard tomorrow in Brussels.
Another of the issues that allied Defense holders will address will be the availability of ammunition. Stoltenberg has acknowledged that the Atlantic Alliance "has a problem" with this issue (so does Russia, he added). When the Russian invasion began, the only way to send military support to Ukraine was to draw on the national arsenals and it is therefore urgent to replenish them both in order to continue to provide aid to the country and to ensure that NATO countries can defend their allied territory. "The rate at which Ukraine spends ammunition is higher than our production rate," he admitted. Currently, the industry does not have sufficient capacity to respond to demand (for large-calibre ammunition, delivery times have gone from 12 to 28 months), hence the urgency to sign multi-year agreements with the industry to strengthen its chains. productive and make the necessary investments to adapt to the new situation, as the United States, France and Norway have done.
On the other hand, in recent days, it is also expected that the allied ministers will decide to reinforce the structure for surveillance of submarine infrastructures set up as a result of the sabotage of the Nord Stream gas pipeline and talk about the flying devices detected and shot down in recent days in North America, about which Washington has kept its partners in the NATO framework informed, according to diplomatic sources. These incidents "are part of a pattern of conduct by China and Russia, which are increasing their surveillance and espionage activities on allied countries," and "demonstrate the importance of NATO vigilance," Stoltenberg said.
