Tank warfare: why the West is worried about arming Ukraine

Ukraine’s top soldier, General Valery Zaluzhny, has said that if he is to launch a successful counter-offensive, the West will have to provide him with another 300 tanks. This is, of course, a negotiating position. President Volodymyr Zelensky’s government has been very effective in managing western allies: cajoling, demanding and guilting them into providing more than they intended. He’s actually going to be getting more tanks, if not 300, now that Berlin has been browbeaten into lifting its objections. Might Germany’s initial reluctance suggest a changing perception of the war? It has certainly revealed the limited nature of the European powers’ arsenals.

Nato countries have already been supplying tanks. In April last year, the Czechs led the way by sending modernised Soviet-era T-72s, followed by most of the other former Warsaw Pact nations. This made sense, as Ukrainian tank and maintenance crews were already familiar with these models. More are heading towards the battlefield, but the controversy now is over supplies of more advanced western-built vehicles.