Expert: There is a shortage of arms on the global market, it is very difficult to buy ammunition

It is very difficult to buy ammunition on the world market, as there is a shortage of shells that has arisen as a result of a shortage of gunpowder. This was stated by military expert Oleksiy Hetman in an exclusive commentary to UNN.

At a press conference, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said that the cost of artillery shells in the world has increased 5 times due to the full-scale war, but Ukraine is fighting for every single round.

It seems that you just went in and bought it, and everything is fine... No, the global arms market is complicated. Prices have also risen there, as often happens when demand increases. Look at the armored vehicles from Germany - they have tripled their prices. There is a shortage of shells in the world because there is a shortage of gunpowder

According to him, countries that produce gunpowder used to do so in a certain amount to meet their needs. However, now the world's needs have increased dramatically and there is not enough gunpowder. He added that the chemical industry is now starting to produce gunpowder more actively, but it will take time.

In addition, according to Hetman, the difficulty of purchasing weapons for the Armed Forces is that not all countries, including those in Europe, support Ukraine in the war.

"We can recall Hungary and Switzerland, which once refused to sell us anti-aircraft missile systems that they wanted to write off, and most likely have already thrown away. I think it's quite obvious why, they don't want to have a conflict with Russia because it's a nuclear country, and they are still afraid of it for some reason," the expert believes.

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The vast majority of the Ukrainian Armed Forces' weapons before the full-scale invasion were, to varying degrees , Soviet inheritance. Therefore, the weapons themselves, spare parts and ammunition are produced mostly in the former Warsaw Pact countries.  Some of the states that have the ammunition Ukraine needs are hostile, such as Russia and Belarus. Ukraine received all possible assistance from other post-socialist countries that joined the EU (Poland, Czech Republic, etc.). 

However, there remains a group of Balkan states that, despite the European integration processes in some of them and support for Ukraine, are still strongly influenced by the Russian Federation. In these states, friends of Russia are still in power and have a significant impact on the policies of their countries. In practice, this is manifested in the fact that despite their overwhelming support for Ukraine, they refuse to supply us with weapons and ammunition directly. Therefore, Ukraine is forced to purchase ammunition from these countries through a number of intermediaries.