Politic?: On The Horns of a Dilemma

"It's about getting quantity at a cheap cost."
"[Falling US inventories help explain the rush to get more arms now; stockpiles are] getting low relative to the levels we like to keep on hand and certainly to the levels we're going to need to deter a China conflict."
"[The US exit from Afghanistan left lots of air-dropped bombs available. They cannot be easily used with Ukrainian aircraft, but] in today's context we should be looking for innovative ways to convert them to standoff capability."
Tom Karako, weapons and security expert, Center for Strategic and International Studies

"I keep telling this to everyone in world media — let nations that operate NASAMS — such as Spain, Australia, and the U.S. — donate just one battery each."
"Many countries have it, and there are many AIM-120 AMRAAM missiles around."
"We’d be able to substantially amplify our defense."
Colonel Yurii Ihnat, spokesman, Ukrainian Air Force

A HIMARS takes part in a military exercise near Liepaja

A M142 High Mobility Artillery Rocket System (HIMARS) takes part in a military exercise near Liepaja, Latvia September 26, 2022. REUTERS/Ints Kalnins/File Photo

Boeing has proposed the supply of cheap, small precision bombs fitted onto available rockets, themselves in great abundance, to allow Kyiv to strike far behind Russian lines. The West has been struggling to supply Ukraine with the arms it requests to equal the playing field in Russia's war imposed upon Ukraine. And the Pentagon has opened its ears to Boeing's suggestion.

Ukraine's need for more and more powerful munitions cannot be denied. Even as the U.S. and allied military inventories continue to shrink. Despite this there is a dire need to supply Ukraine, valiantly fighting for its very existence against an indomitable enemy whose reputation has recently been shattered as a nation whose fighting forces are unbeatable. Ukraine has proven otherwise and sorely requires more ammunition to entirely rout Russian forces from its sovereign territory.

More weapons, more sophisticated equipment is due Ukraine and Boeing's proposed system, Ground-Launched Small Diameter Bomb (GLSDB) is now included in a handful of plans to launch new munitions into production for Ukraine and for other Eastern European nations jittery about Moscow's intentions with respect to their own sovereign rights as former USSR satellites.

The West has struggled to meet Ukraine's demand for more arms.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy's previous appeals to the U.S. to provide his forces with the 297-km range ATACMS missile were spurned; the range of the GLSDH's 250-km would still see Ukraine hit valuable military targets out of reach at present, to aid its counterattacks in disrupting Russian rear areas. The U.S. previously had forbidden Ukraine to press any advantage it might gain from bombing directly into Russia, for fear of widening the conflict.

This injunction effectively pinned Ukraine's left arm behind its back, allowing its right arm free rein to defend itself as best it could. The prospect of delivering GLSDBs by spring of 2023 banks on the Ukrainian military succeeding in continuing its aggressive counteroffensive that has proven so disastrous for the Russian military, forcing its ignominious retreat from Ukrainian territory President Putin had 'annexed' and declared part of Russia's geography.

Weapons experts made familiar with the plan point out that the GBU-39 Small Diameter Bomb (SDB) with the M26 rocket motor are plentiful in U.S. weapons inventories. In the meanwhile, Russian missiles are relentlessly being showered over cities all over Ukraine, in a deliberate plan to render the country utterly miserable during the coming winter months aiming directly at the country's infrastructure, as Russia continues to advance its war crimes targeting civilian areas and inevitably causing civilian deaths.