The next meeting of the Contact Group for the Defense of Ukraine, better known as Ramstein, will take place on March 19.
This meeting of the heads of defense departments and military leaders of Ukraine’s partner countries will be the 20th in a row and will be held in person at the US Air Force base in Germany.
What to expect from the next Ramstein and what weapons Ukraine may receive as a result of the meeting — read on Facts ICTV.
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What is known about Ramstein-20
It became known on March 9 that the next meeting of the Contact Group will take place on March 19 at Ramstein Air Base in Germany. Since then, public contacts have taken place at the level of the military leadership of Ukraine and the United States, namely: Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces of Ukraine Alexander Syrsky and Defense Minister Rustem Umerov communicated with Pentagon head Lloyd Austin. The parties discussed, in particular, preparations for the next meeting. Also, official Kyiv provided information about the situation on the battlefield.
The Pentagon later confirmed that Lloyd Austin, along with Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Charles Brown Jr., would join other defense chiefs and senior military officials from nearly 50 countries to discuss the war in Ukraine.
Later, on March 15, during a meeting in Germany between German Chancellor Olaf Scholz, French President Emmanuel Macron and Polish Prime Minister Andrzej Duda, new plans for supplies to Ukraine were announced.
So, we were talking about the purchase of weapons by Western countries for Ukraine on the world market, as well as increasing production in Ukraine itself.
Ukraine’s partner countries are also planning to create a new coalition of long-range rocket artillery within the Ramstein format.
Already on March 18, the Pentagon announced that US Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin went on an official visit to Germany, where he will participate in a meeting of the Contact Group on the Defense of Ukraine.
What weapons can Ukraine get at Ramstein
Ukraine’s partners traditionally do not specify the range of weapons that will be transferred to the Ukrainian Armed Forces. This is done both for security and for lack of information for the Russian side. So this time there were no clarifications regarding the weapons that Ukraine could receive as a result of Ramstein-20.
At the same time, from the announcements made by the leaders of Western countries, it can be assumed that we are probably talking about weapons for Western MLRS, like HIMARS or M270.
As the deputy director of the Ukrainian Center for Army Research, Conversion and Disarmament Mikhail Samus stated in a commentary to Facts ICTV, we are probably talking about ammunition that is already used by the Ukrainian Armed Forces in the confrontation with the Russian Federation. These are, in particular, GMLRS shells, GLSDB cruise bombs and ATACMS ballistic missiles.
— I think that we are talking about the complexes that we have in service in order to increase their number and provide them with ammunition. This will be enough, in particular, to improve the capabilities of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, — says Samus.
At the same time, coordination of the efforts of Ukraine’s partners to supply 800 thousand artillery ammunition, which were found by the Czech Republic in third countries, will be no less important, Samus points out. Over the past weeks, many Western countries have joined the Czech initiative to purchase these ammunition, in particular Portugal, Germany, the Netherlands, Belgium, France, Norway, Sweden, Canada, and Denmark. The full list of countries that have joined this initiative has not been disclosed.
In turn, German political scientist, analyst at the Stockholm Center for Eastern European Studies Andreas Umlandbelieves that during the Ramstein-20 meeting, circular supplies of long-range missiles can be discussed.
— The UK proposed a so-called round-trip exchange, in which Germany would give Britain its Taurus missiles, and in return the UK would give Storm Shadow missiles to Ukraine. This would be a way out of the impasse that exists in German-Ukrainian relations, — Umland said on the FreeDom TV channel.
According to Umland, it is on this Ramstein that these circular deliveries can be coordinated.
Military expert Samus points out that an equally important topic will be coordinating the capabilities of partner countries in a situation where the crisis in Congress continues in the United States, where Republicans cannot pass a support package for Ukraine.
— This is why Ramstein was created: to coordinate assistance to Ukraine. Coordination — this means adaptation to certain conditions… The same goes for American help. If the Americans move away from actually providing assistance, then the entire list of requests from the Ukrainian Ministry of Defense, which is on the table, is now distributed among European partners, — he points out.
We also note that in the framework of previous meetings of the Contact Group on the Defense of Ukraine, support packages for the Ukrainian air defense forces were almost always agreed upon: either parts for air defense systems (for example, launchers), or ammunition or missiles were supplied for certain air defense systems. However, this time there have been no announcements on strengthening Ukrainian air defense.
