- Messages
- 1,806
- Reactions
- Nation of residence
-
- Nation of origin
-
The topic of ATACMS Ballistic Missiles has been a popular one on this board and around the internet. But there have been plenty of misconceptions regarding ATACMS and the reasons that they were not being sent to Ukraine.
The popular narrative was that is was more of a political decision, because the U.S. didn't want to risk Ukraine striking into Russia with the long range weapon. In reality, however, that was and always has been only a secondary consideration. The fact is that Ukraine listens when the USA definitively tells them not to use U.S. donated long range weapons in Russia proper. Ukraine doesn't dare do anything to the contrary, out of fear that they will have their access to those weapons cut off for geopolitical reasons.
The truth is that USA genuinely did not have many that they were willing to send from their strategic arsenal. Estimates were that the U.S. Army and Marine Corps had approximately 1200-1500 ATACMS units in their arsenal and that included M39 shorter range, older variants, complemented by newer M48 and M57 (unitary warhead) variants. Eventually, USA chose to send a small number (20 or fewer) of the older M39 variant, to use specifically against two Russian helicopter bases in occupied Ukraine, that housed the KA-52s that were wreaking havoc on Ukrainian armor. We saw those missiles used to devastating effect last fall, when Ukraine decimated 14 KA-52s in a single night at the aerodromes mentioned above, forcing the Russians to pull their KA-52s back into Russia and out of the fight.
Fast forward to today and the situation surrounding ATACMS has changed significantly with the arrival of the PrSM (Precision Strike Missile) into U.S. Army inventories. The PrSM is a drastic upgrade that is quickly making ATACMS obsolete in U.S. inventories, which in turn, increases the number that can be sent to Ukraine. USA received its first PrSM's in December, 2023. They are scheduled to receive many more throughout 2024 and the U.S. Army recently signed a new contract with Lockheed Martin to purchase an additional $219 million usd worth of PrSM's in a contract that will carryover into 2025. Every time a new batch of PrSMs arrives, more ATACMS can be sent to Ukraine and it appears that the M48 and M57 extended range variants are now being sent as well. A recent strike on the Dzhankoy airfield in Crimea saw ATACMS used to shred Russian S-300 air defense systems on site.
Furthermore, Lockheed Martin remains at a full rate production of 500 M57 ATACMS missiles each year, most of which are for export to American Allies such as Poland, Australia, South Korea, and recently, the Baltic countries. However, a portion of those 500 M57 variants were being purchased by the U.S. military each year and now that they are buying PrSMs instead, those missiles can now be purchased using American USAI funding and will be sent directly to Ukraine. Recently, in the $6 Billion usd USAI package , the category "Ammunition for HIMARS" was included as an item that would be procured directly from American industry. Make no mistake, that was worded in that manner to be purposely generic and avoid specifying GMLRS vs ATACMS, both of which are munitions fired by HIMARS and both of which were purchased under that title.
So that leaves the important question of just how many ATACMS (of all variants) can Ukraine expect to receive? I think that if we're going to speculate, it would serve us well to be conservative. Let's say that from PDA USA will be willing to send 1 ATACM for each 1 PrSM that they receive in 2024. From all public sources that are available, it appears USA will receive approximately 75 PrSM's, after receiving 55 in the initial December, 2023 batch. That means by the end of 2024 USA will have received roughly 130 PrSMs, which, in turn, should make 130 ATACMs available for transfer to Ukraine. If we factor in USAI procurement direct from Lockheed Martin (which previously went to USA) we can, conservatively, add another 50 missiles to that total. Therefore, in 2024 Ukraine should get approximately 180 mixed variant ATACMS to bolster their medium / long range strike capability. Certainly enough to do substantial damage to Russian bases in Crimea and in the rear of the Donbas, but not nearly enough to act as some silver bullet.
So if Ukraine can reasonably expect to receive 180'ish ATACMs over a 12 month period, what weapons can / need to be sent to augment their medium / long range strike capability? That equation starts and likely ends, with Western cruise missiles. Ukraine has already proven that they can use British / French made Stormshadow / SCALP-EG cruise missiles highly effectively. The problem, of course, is supply and Ukraine is short when it comes to the quantity it possesses in its inventory. So how many more will they get in 2024? Earlier this year French Prime Minister Macron announced that France would send an additional 40 units of SCALP-EG in 2024. Meanwhile, Britain announced that they will be sending additional Stormshadow missiles among a package of 1600 strike / air defense missiles. But how many of those missiles are Stormshadow cruise missiles? We don't know for sure, but let's be conservative and go with the number 40, to match the French donation. Britain announced just this week that domestic manufacturer MBDA is moving into surge production of Stormshadow to restock British inventories and increase availability to Ukraine. What we've found out recently, however, is that another country has quietly pledged to donate Stormshadow as well and that country is Italy, who helped the French and British design the cruise missiles and also stocks large quantities of them. Because Italy is highly secretive of the quantities of what they send to Ukraine, we must be ultra-conservative in guessing how many units they are willing to send. Let's go with 20 units in 2024, half as many as their British and French counterparts. That brings the conservative total of Stormshadow cruise missiles from France, Britain and Italy, for Ukraine, up to roughly 100 units in 2024, all of which can be fired from Ukraine's fleet of SU-24 aircraft.
While the European contribution of cruise missiles has the capacity to be impactful this year, it's really USA that truly has the ability to send a meaningful number of cruise missiles to Ukraine in 2024. Those missiles, of course, are JASSM cruise missiles, which Ukraine will be able to launch when it receives it's initial batch of F-16s at some point this summer. JASSM has the ability to be the ultimate compliment to Stormshadow / SCALP-EG and ATACMS, as Ukraine seeks long range strike solutions. As it stands, the U.S. Air Force keeps an inventory of 1000-1500 JASSM cruise missiles on hand at any given time. Meanwhile, Lockheed Martin produces an additional 550'ish units per year for domestic consumption and foreign sales. Funding in the most recent Ukrainian aid package will provide requisite dollars to increase that number to close to 1000 units per year, which is Lockheed Martin's stated goal. USA purchases 400-450 JASSMs per year, with the remainder sold to Allies. That means any JASSMs sent to Ukraine will come directly from American Air Force inventories for the foreseeable future, using PDA. So what's a reasonable number that USA can afford to send along with the arrival of Ukraine's F-16s? Given that USA will receive another batch of close to 500 JASSMs in 2024, one could see them being willing to send Ukraine approximately 200 units from their exisiting inventories. As the JASSM-ER and JASSM-XR gain favour in U.S. Air Force inventories, the original JASSM missiles remaining are aging and becoming increasingly obsolete for American purposes. With substantial funds recently passed to surge production and replace them with more of the newer variants, 200 older model JASSMs seems like a reasonable and conservative number.
In summation, using a substantial amount of sourcing, combined with highly conservative estimates, it's my prediction that Ukraine will receive the following medium / long range strike weapons in 2024.
M39 / M48 / M57 ATACMS (USA PDA): 130 units
M57 ATACMS (USA USAI): 50 units
Stormshadow (Britain): 40 units
SCALP-EG (France): 40 units
Stormshadow (Italy): 20 units
JASSM (USA PDA): 200 units
Total: 480 medium / long range strike ballistic and cruise missiles.
The popular narrative was that is was more of a political decision, because the U.S. didn't want to risk Ukraine striking into Russia with the long range weapon. In reality, however, that was and always has been only a secondary consideration. The fact is that Ukraine listens when the USA definitively tells them not to use U.S. donated long range weapons in Russia proper. Ukraine doesn't dare do anything to the contrary, out of fear that they will have their access to those weapons cut off for geopolitical reasons.
The truth is that USA genuinely did not have many that they were willing to send from their strategic arsenal. Estimates were that the U.S. Army and Marine Corps had approximately 1200-1500 ATACMS units in their arsenal and that included M39 shorter range, older variants, complemented by newer M48 and M57 (unitary warhead) variants. Eventually, USA chose to send a small number (20 or fewer) of the older M39 variant, to use specifically against two Russian helicopter bases in occupied Ukraine, that housed the KA-52s that were wreaking havoc on Ukrainian armor. We saw those missiles used to devastating effect last fall, when Ukraine decimated 14 KA-52s in a single night at the aerodromes mentioned above, forcing the Russians to pull their KA-52s back into Russia and out of the fight.
Fast forward to today and the situation surrounding ATACMS has changed significantly with the arrival of the PrSM (Precision Strike Missile) into U.S. Army inventories. The PrSM is a drastic upgrade that is quickly making ATACMS obsolete in U.S. inventories, which in turn, increases the number that can be sent to Ukraine. USA received its first PrSM's in December, 2023. They are scheduled to receive many more throughout 2024 and the U.S. Army recently signed a new contract with Lockheed Martin to purchase an additional $219 million usd worth of PrSM's in a contract that will carryover into 2025. Every time a new batch of PrSMs arrives, more ATACMS can be sent to Ukraine and it appears that the M48 and M57 extended range variants are now being sent as well. A recent strike on the Dzhankoy airfield in Crimea saw ATACMS used to shred Russian S-300 air defense systems on site.
Furthermore, Lockheed Martin remains at a full rate production of 500 M57 ATACMS missiles each year, most of which are for export to American Allies such as Poland, Australia, South Korea, and recently, the Baltic countries. However, a portion of those 500 M57 variants were being purchased by the U.S. military each year and now that they are buying PrSMs instead, those missiles can now be purchased using American USAI funding and will be sent directly to Ukraine. Recently, in the $6 Billion usd USAI package , the category "Ammunition for HIMARS" was included as an item that would be procured directly from American industry. Make no mistake, that was worded in that manner to be purposely generic and avoid specifying GMLRS vs ATACMS, both of which are munitions fired by HIMARS and both of which were purchased under that title.
So that leaves the important question of just how many ATACMS (of all variants) can Ukraine expect to receive? I think that if we're going to speculate, it would serve us well to be conservative. Let's say that from PDA USA will be willing to send 1 ATACM for each 1 PrSM that they receive in 2024. From all public sources that are available, it appears USA will receive approximately 75 PrSM's, after receiving 55 in the initial December, 2023 batch. That means by the end of 2024 USA will have received roughly 130 PrSMs, which, in turn, should make 130 ATACMs available for transfer to Ukraine. If we factor in USAI procurement direct from Lockheed Martin (which previously went to USA) we can, conservatively, add another 50 missiles to that total. Therefore, in 2024 Ukraine should get approximately 180 mixed variant ATACMS to bolster their medium / long range strike capability. Certainly enough to do substantial damage to Russian bases in Crimea and in the rear of the Donbas, but not nearly enough to act as some silver bullet.
So if Ukraine can reasonably expect to receive 180'ish ATACMs over a 12 month period, what weapons can / need to be sent to augment their medium / long range strike capability? That equation starts and likely ends, with Western cruise missiles. Ukraine has already proven that they can use British / French made Stormshadow / SCALP-EG cruise missiles highly effectively. The problem, of course, is supply and Ukraine is short when it comes to the quantity it possesses in its inventory. So how many more will they get in 2024? Earlier this year French Prime Minister Macron announced that France would send an additional 40 units of SCALP-EG in 2024. Meanwhile, Britain announced that they will be sending additional Stormshadow missiles among a package of 1600 strike / air defense missiles. But how many of those missiles are Stormshadow cruise missiles? We don't know for sure, but let's be conservative and go with the number 40, to match the French donation. Britain announced just this week that domestic manufacturer MBDA is moving into surge production of Stormshadow to restock British inventories and increase availability to Ukraine. What we've found out recently, however, is that another country has quietly pledged to donate Stormshadow as well and that country is Italy, who helped the French and British design the cruise missiles and also stocks large quantities of them. Because Italy is highly secretive of the quantities of what they send to Ukraine, we must be ultra-conservative in guessing how many units they are willing to send. Let's go with 20 units in 2024, half as many as their British and French counterparts. That brings the conservative total of Stormshadow cruise missiles from France, Britain and Italy, for Ukraine, up to roughly 100 units in 2024, all of which can be fired from Ukraine's fleet of SU-24 aircraft.
While the European contribution of cruise missiles has the capacity to be impactful this year, it's really USA that truly has the ability to send a meaningful number of cruise missiles to Ukraine in 2024. Those missiles, of course, are JASSM cruise missiles, which Ukraine will be able to launch when it receives it's initial batch of F-16s at some point this summer. JASSM has the ability to be the ultimate compliment to Stormshadow / SCALP-EG and ATACMS, as Ukraine seeks long range strike solutions. As it stands, the U.S. Air Force keeps an inventory of 1000-1500 JASSM cruise missiles on hand at any given time. Meanwhile, Lockheed Martin produces an additional 550'ish units per year for domestic consumption and foreign sales. Funding in the most recent Ukrainian aid package will provide requisite dollars to increase that number to close to 1000 units per year, which is Lockheed Martin's stated goal. USA purchases 400-450 JASSMs per year, with the remainder sold to Allies. That means any JASSMs sent to Ukraine will come directly from American Air Force inventories for the foreseeable future, using PDA. So what's a reasonable number that USA can afford to send along with the arrival of Ukraine's F-16s? Given that USA will receive another batch of close to 500 JASSMs in 2024, one could see them being willing to send Ukraine approximately 200 units from their exisiting inventories. As the JASSM-ER and JASSM-XR gain favour in U.S. Air Force inventories, the original JASSM missiles remaining are aging and becoming increasingly obsolete for American purposes. With substantial funds recently passed to surge production and replace them with more of the newer variants, 200 older model JASSMs seems like a reasonable and conservative number.
In summation, using a substantial amount of sourcing, combined with highly conservative estimates, it's my prediction that Ukraine will receive the following medium / long range strike weapons in 2024.
M39 / M48 / M57 ATACMS (USA PDA): 130 units
M57 ATACMS (USA USAI): 50 units
Stormshadow (Britain): 40 units
SCALP-EG (France): 40 units
Stormshadow (Italy): 20 units
JASSM (USA PDA): 200 units
Total: 480 medium / long range strike ballistic and cruise missiles.
Last edited:
is retiring its Patriot Batteries in favour of more advanced Iron Dome, David's Sling and Arrow 3 air defense systems, after a surge of funding from the United States 
in the recently passed aid supplemental.
the additional Patriot Batteries they've been asking for. Whether sold to Ukraine directly, or purchased by USA for direct transfer to Ukraine, Ukraine is looking for a total of 7 Patriot batteries to compliment their SAMP/T Battery, as well as their tier 2 and tier 3 systems such as NASAMS, IRIS-T SLM / SLS, FrankenSAM, Skynex, Crotale, Gepard, Avenger, etc... 
funds are keeping the government solvent while they they do that.
Australia 
and Latvia 
have jumped on board the string of countries announcing new military aid packages for Ukraine 
in giving Ukraine 0.25% of their GDP in military aid in 2024 and beyond. They announced a new aid package today consisting of undisclosed air defense and enhanced UAV production.
