Within a few months, the Pentagon will not be able to send some weapons to Kiev without emptying their own inventory.
The US will soon have no new Javelin anti-tank missiles to spare for Ukraine, Bloomberg reported on Tuesday.
As much as a third of the US military's inventory of Javelins has already been consumed by the war. It said that the Pentagon will not be able to deliver new ones within months without emptying out its own supply.
The US has depleted a quarter of its stock of Stinger portable anti-aircraft missiles, and it could take up to a year for their manufacturer, Raytheon, to restart production.
The production of shoulder-fired missile systems was disrupted by a mix of factors, including Covid-related problems, microchip supply, and a shortage of skilled workers in the defense industry, according to Bloomberg.
Washington has shipped around 7,000 Javelins to Ukraine, and Kiev is trying to stop Russia's military campaign in the country.
President Joe Biden toured Lockheed Martin's Javelin-making plant in early May, calling the weapon extremely effective. Russia launched a military operation against its neighboring state on February 24 and the US and other NATO countries have been increasingly providing weapons to Ukraine. The Pentagon shipments included 7,000 Javelins, drones, howitzers and radars.
Russia attacked Ukraine after Kiev s failure to implement the terms of the Minsk agreements, first signed in 2014, and Moscow s eventual recognition of the Donbass republics of Donetsk and Lugansk. The German and French-brokered protocol was designed to give the breakaway regions special status within the Ukrainian state.
The Kremlin has since demanded that Ukraine officially declare itself a neutral country that will never join the US-led NATO military bloc. Kiev insists the Russian offensive was unprovoked and has denied it plans to retake the two republics by force.