Ukraine’s New Heavy Artillery Will Cause Russia a World of Pain

KYLE MIZOKAMI

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As Western countries ship increasingly heavy arms to a beleaguered Ukraine, one of the most important transfers so far is an arsenal’s worth of field howitzers. Unlike the Ukrainian army’s existing big guns, these artillery pieces come in NATO calibers and are the key to unlocking the West’s precision-guided artillery technology. The tech, which includes GPS-guided artillery shells and tank-hunting munitions, could make Ukraine’s cannon-cockers exponentially more powerful.

Ukraine’s army has halted Russia’s advance into the country, and in some cases—like northwest of Kyiv—even sent the Russian Ground Forces scurrying back across the border. The Ukrainians have relied heavily on field artillery to hold off Russia’s invasion and consider it their most effective weapon. A recent study from the United Kingdom-based Royal United Services Institute cites a Ukrainian military official as saying “anti-tank missiles slowed the Russians down, but what killed them was our artillery. That was what broke their units.”