The flood of arms in Ukraine raises fears of arms smuggling

The illegal arms market in Ukraine has grown since the first Russian invasion in 2014, exacerbated by an excessive amount of scattered weapons and limited control over their use.

This disturbing fact for the United States and its allies came at the urgent request of President Volodymyr Zelensky to provide the artillery needed to counter Russian forces in the east and south of the country. The Ukrainian leader’s speeches belong to the House of Representatives, which joined behind the latest funding call, with a bilateral vote of 368.57 on Tuesday. But an unprecedented influx of weapons has raised fears that some equipment may fall into the hands of Western enemies or reappear in distant conflicts for decades.

“It’s impossible to track not only where they went and who used them, but how they used them,” said Rachel Stoll, vice president and gun control specialist at the Stimson Center.

A State Department spokesperson said it had conducted a comprehensive review of US-supplied Ukrainian units, forcing Kiev to sign agreements that “will not allow the transfer of equipment to third parties without the prior consent of the US government.”

But the tools to enforce such contracts are relatively weak, or even weaker, due to Washington’s mixed compliance history over the past month.

The defeat of Afghanistan on the battlefield with Russia The victory of Ukraine

In mid-April, the United States increased its involvement in the Ukrainian conflict, announcing that it would deliver to Ukraine a fleet of Mi-17 helicopters purchased by Russia nearly a decade ago. During the initial sale of the aircraft, the US asked for a contract to be concluded that the helicopters would not be delivered to a third country “without the consent of the Russian Federation”. Copy Certificate published on the website of the Federal Military-Technical Cooperation Service of Russia.

Russia condemned the move, saying it “grossly violates the principles of international law”.

Arms experts say Russia’s brutal aggression in Ukraine further justifies US support, but violations of arms deals hamper non-proliferation efforts.

“Violations of these end-use agreements pose a serious threat to countries’ control over the use of arms,” ​​said Jeff Abramson, a conventional arms transfer specialist at the Arms Control Association.

“Similar and unsubstantiated claims about the Russian nuclear program have been made more than once,” a Pentagon spokesman said Friday.

“Russia’s accusations are an unscrupulous attempt to divert attention from the unprovoked invasion of Russia and the history of aggressive actions against Ukraine since 2014,” said Marine Corps Lieutenant Colonel Anton T. semolina

Ensuring the targeted use of weapons by the United States – a joint responsibility of the Ministries of State and Defense – is further complicated by the large amount of weapons destined for Ukraine.

Emergency Spending Bill, pending Senate approval, will show Ukraine will be the world’s largest recipient of U.S. security aid in 2022, receiving more than the U.S. gives to Afghanistan, Iraq or Israel in one year.

The Pentagon will purchase laser missiles and surveillance drones from Ukraine

US-supplied weapons to Ukraine to add to these promotions 1,400 Stinger anti-aircraft systems, 5,500 anti-tank missiles, 700 Switchblades, 90 Howitzer long-range artillery systems, 7,000 small arms, 50,000,000 ammunition and many other mines and laser explosive systems included.

Shoulder-mounted Stinger missiles that can shoot down commercial aircraft are just a weapon system that experts fear may fall into the hands of terrorist groups seeking to inflict mass casualties.

The Biden administration’s funding request includes $ 8.7 billion to supply US arms shipments to Ukraine, $ 6 billion to train and equip Ukrainian forces, and $ 3.9 billion to deploy troops across Europe in response to the war-torn security crisis.

Other NATO countries have transferred billions of dollars in weapons and military equipment since the start of hostilities.

“Aid exceeds the peak of US military aid to Afghan security forces during the 20-year war,” said William Hartung, arms control expert at the Quins Institute. “In this case, the United States had a large presence in the country and that at least provided an opportunity to track where the guns were going. By comparison, the US government is blind to tracking weapons supplied to civilian and military militias in Ukraine.

Ukraine’s history as a center for arms trading dates back to the collapse of the Soviet Union, when Soviet troops left large numbers of small arms and light weapons in Ukraine without proper inventory registration and control. According to the Geneva-based research organization Small Arms Survey, in 1992 a part of the Ukrainian army 7.1 million small arms shares were “moved to conflict zones”, highlighting the “risk of leaks on the local black market “.

The problem was exacerbated after the Russian invasion in 2014, when militants looted weapons and ammunition from the Ukrainian security service, the Ministry of Internal Affairs and Defense. “Regulated fighters on both sides have gradually gained access to a wide variety of military-grade equipment, including all light and small arms,” ​​says the 2017 Small Arms Research report. He said. Small arms and light weapons were looted or lost from 2013 to 2015 ”, a boon for the black market in this country, run by mafia groups and other criminal networks in the Donbas region.

The US government is well aware of the difficulties in distributing weapons in the country, although it is vague in the description of the measures.

On February 24, weeks after the last Russian invasion of Ukraine, a group of interacting officials from the Biden administration met with external arms control experts to discuss the risk of small arms proliferation in the conflict. Stoll, who attended one of the meetings, said US officials were guaranteed to review reports on the inspection and unauthorized relocation of Ukrainian security forces, but with minor details on how the inspection was carried out or monitoring.

“He’s not very confident,” Stoll said.

Other weapons specialists feel the same way in the dark.

“It is unclear what risk mitigation or monitoring measures the United States and other countries have taken, or what safeguards they have taken to ensure the protection of civilians through these very large transfers,” said Annie Schiel, senior consultant with the Civilian Center. In conflict.

Some of the suggested steps include setting up a private investigator to ensure that any arms transfer includes strict surveillance procedures, adding human rights obligations to the terms of sale, and providing details on which units could receive such transfers, as it did. the US government in Afghanistan. . (In 2018, Congress banned Ukraine’s Azov Battalion, a far-right nationalist group that adheres to neo-Nazism by adopting American weapons.)

There are growing concerns among control groups over arms proliferation from Moscow, amid reports of mercenaries from Libya, Syria and Chechnya, as well as mercenaries from a Russian contractor, the Wagner Group.

In a televised meeting of the Russian Security Council in March, Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu said 16,000 volunteers in the Middle East are ready to fight alongside Russian-backed forces in eastern Ukraine.

In response, Russian President Vladimir Putin offered his consent, saying: “We must give them what they want and help them enter the conflict zone.”

At the same meeting, Shoigu offered to deliver captured Javelin and Stinger missiles to pro-Russian separatists in the Donbas region. “Please do it,” Putin told Shoigu.

The involvement of foreign fighters in the conflict risks returning their weapons to their country of origin once the conflict in Ukraine is over. ᲐRian, current conflicting reports However, there are reports of foreign fighters present and it is unclear how many actually went to Ukraine.

The lack of information led to requests for responses from management and the attention of Congress.

“Some of the weapons supplied during the conflict in Ukraine will likely be found within years and possibly decades,” Abramson said. “Congressional leaders should ask these questions at confidential briefings if necessary, and the public should be better informed,” he said.