Germany supplies twelve self-propelled howitzers against Putin’s army

Ukraine is getting new weapons that it is familiar with: the Panzerhaubitze 2000 – half a dozen of them immediately. And President Zelenskyj is probably still dissatisfied.

Ramstein – “The tank loves cleanliness,” said artilleryman “Mykola”. New York Times the tanker of the 43rd Artillery Brigade has expressed his concerns. In the middle of last year, Ukraine reported how it had attacked Vladimir Putin’s invading troops with the German Panzerhaubitze 2000. An effective long-range weapon – now the German government is upping the ante, although it knows that users have difficulties with how the NYT reported.

During training in Germany, the Ukrainians saw how the PzH 2000 self-propelled howitzer was kept in special air-conditioned hangars, the paper writes. “The crew must also put on boots or special overshoes or slippers when they go into the howitzer. Each vehicle has a vacuum cleaner to ensure cleanliness.” Ukraine is now receiving a dozen more of these weapons.

Pistorius confident: Support for Ukraine guaranteed until 2026

“We will be able to continue the support until 2026,” stressed Federal Minister of Defence Boris Pistorius (SPD) during the 24th meeting of the so-called Ukraine Contact Group at the US base in Ramstein in Rhineland-Palatinate. “We remain in a continuous supply process for Ukraine.” The federal government has so far deployed 14 self-propelled howitzers to the front as part of the upgrade initiative.

“Nobody survives within a radius of 50 meters, the soldier explained. Several thousand fragments would destroy everything. The soldiers can also set the projectiles so that they explode over the heads of the enemy. The fragments also pierce armored vehicles. Against enemy tanks, the crews can use special ammunition that automatically detects the vehicles with its sensors and is able to break through their steel.”

In April 2022, then Defense Minister Christine Lambrecht (SPD) announced the delivery of the first Panzerhaubitzen 2000 to Ukraine, as the German Armed Forces reported. The heavy equipment did not have to be taken from the active troops’ inventory, but came from Army Maintenance Logistics, a federal company that had maintained the artillery guns.

The sensitive electronics “go crazy when exposed to moisture or dirt,” Mykola continued. Once the weapon had fired around 120 rounds, the crew would have to spend a whole day on maintenance, the NYT about it. Its good reputation had preceded it to the front. With its range of up to 40 kilometers, it was supposed to keep the Russians at a distance – which it failed to do in many skirmishes because it was used tactically incorrectly, or because there was a lack of ammunition, the barrels glowed from the continuous fire, or the Ukrainian soil proved too weak for the 60-tonner.

Panzerhaubitze 2000: This weapon alone has not won the Ukraine war against Putin

The weapon has not yet won the war for Ukraine, but it may have kept the defenders in the game. Pistorius has promised Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky six of the new self-propelled howitzers for this year, with the rest to follow next year, according to the defense minister.

In order to continue to put pressure on Russia, the Ukrainian armed forces need armored combat and support vehicles in particular, as the Federal Ministry of Defense makes clear. Germany has already delivered 58 Leopard 1 A5 battle tanks together with Denmark. A further 77 Leopard 1 A5s will be added as soon as possible in a project with Denmark and the Netherlands. The delivery of further mine-clearing and bridge-laying tanks as well as armored recovery vehicles and armored troop transporters is also planned, explains the Defense Ministry.

Strengthened enemy: Russia’s artillery performance has grown during the war

Above all, Russia’s artillery performance has grown during the war, as Jack Watling of the think tank Royal United Services Institute (RUSI) claims. According to his expertise, the Russian
s have now developed the ability to fire back at Ukrainian artillery positions within just two minutes of their first shot. Previously, Russian soldiers needed five to 20 minutes to counterattack. This apparently was not achieved by introducing new systems, but simply because the Russians streamlined the process by giving the firing artillery forces direct access to the target location capabilities required for this.

This makes a weapon like the Panzerhaubitze 2000 all the more important for Ukraine. “You don’t want to get caught in the place where the explosives explode,” Mike Szymanski, a Bundeswehr artilleryman for the South German Newspaper (SZ) This was in May of the first year of the war, and supplying one’s own weapons to a war was once again a taboo violation of German foreign policy.

Nightmare from afar: Several thousand fragments destroy everything

“Within a radius of 50 meters, no one survives, the soldier explained. Several thousand fragments would destroy everything. The soldiers can also set the projectiles so that they explode over the heads of the enemy. The fragments also pierce armored vehicles. Against enemy tanks, the crews can use special ammunition that automatically recognizes the vehicles with its sensors and is able to break through their steel,” wrote the SZ further.

However, the weapon had never proven its combat capability and had rather rusted away in the Bundeswehr’s stocks. While the South German Newspaper At the end of December, when he wrote of 121 systems in the Bundeswehr’s inventory, the star only 105 examples were counted. “There are currently 73 of them in the ‘army’s available stock’, and their operational readiness is ‘around 50 percent’. This leaves around 36 operational self-propelled howitzers,” wrote the magazine, citing the French news agency French Press Agency (AFP).

New offensive against Putin: Artillery is the main vehicle for the firefight in depth

Apparently the self-propelled gun was less robust than desired, or the Ukrainian artillerymen, who had just been trained in Germany, had lost control of the high-tech cannon – in any case, the Mirror At the end of the first year of the war, it was reported that the freshly repaired guns were already ready for repair. “In Bundeswehr circles it was said that the Ukrainians were currently firing around 300 shells a day, which was putting a lot of wear and tear on the weapon systems.”

In the course of the Ukraine war, it is also said to have become known that a self-propelled howitzer fired more than 20,000 shells without changing barrels – this was reported by the military blog hartpunkt.de reported in May. “Artillery is the main vehicle for deep-level firefighting,” says Dietmar Felber in the Bundeswehr podcast Inquired.

From the First World War to the regional wars in Iraq, between 60 and 80 percent of losses were due to the effect of artillery, explains the colonel and head of the Bundeswehr’s artillery school, explaining the importance of this branch of the military in the Ukraine war. In contrast to previous wars, drones and digital communication have made wars faster and put the artillery under pressure: Shoot & Scoot is the order of the day in Ukraine, i.e. fire and move. Vladimir Putin has taught the world that a cannon now belongs on a wheel or a track to survive in combat.

Selenskyj allegedly dissatisfied: The President of Ukraine would have preferred to have missiles

The magazine War on the Rocks quoted Doug Bush as saying in September last year that “fire strategy will influence important decisions in his department, including the question of how to meet the need for extended-range cannon artillery,” as the person responsible for procurement for the US Army explains – he points out the complexity of these issues: “Where do you need towed artillery, where do you perhaps need tracked or wheeled vehicles? What can you do with ammunition to achieve range instead of building new cannons?”