After the German government delivered 100,000 DM51A2 hand grenades from Bundeswehr stocks to Ukraine in the first half of 2022 to reinforce the defence campaign against the Russian army, these are now being re-procured in identical quantities with the newer DM51A3 version.
A contract to this effect was awarded to Diehl Defence in Nonnweiler, according to a publication on the European public procurement platform TED.
100,000 DM51A3s were immediately ordered, while a further 198,370 hand grenades are part of a framework agreement and can therefore be optionally ordered in the future.
While a price for the hand grenades was not disclosed, it was at least announced that the delivery is expected to be completed by the end of April 2025.
The price of a DM51 hand grenade in 1996 was 33.60 euros. Taking only the inflation into account, a hand grenade would therefore cost 52.66 euros today, which would give the procurement an approximate value of 5.26 million euros.
The DM51A2 is a highly effective hand grenade that can be used both as a pure HE hand grenade and, thanks to its removable splinter body, as a hand grenade with a splinter effect — lethal within a radius of around 10 metres.
Although one might assume that the 100,000 hand grenades supplied would be used up relatively quickly, as they were delivered in the first six months of the full-scale invasion, this is most likely not the case.
On the one hand, pictures and videos of hand grenades in the possession of Ukrainian soldiers appear from time to time.
On the other hand, the aide of Armed Forces Commander in Chief Valerii Zaluzhnyi, Major Hennadii Chastiakov, died at the beginning of November 2023 from an explosion of such a hand grenade after a colleague had given him several as a birthday present. So we can hardly speak of a shortage.
Of course, the production, and delivery of these hand grenades to the Bundeswehr makes a future delivery to the Armed Forces of Ukraine more likely — either from Bundeswehr stocks or directly by Diehl Defence.
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