The Czech ammunition initiative, which was announced in spring 2024, is intended to supply Ukraine with urgently needed artillery ammunition. A total of 800,000 shells were located outside Europe – consisting of 500,000 155mm shells and 300,000 122mm shells.
All it takes are various countries throwing their money into a Czech pot, which is then used to buy this ammunition and deliver it to Ukraine. Since the announcement of the initiative some months ago, 18 countries have made pledges, while the German government has made the largest one to date.
Europe’s economically strongest country has contributed a total of €576 million. This will cover a total of 180,000 155mm artillery shells. The Czech Prime Minister has now announced on X (formerly known as Twitter) that the first artillery shells that arrived in Ukraine were paid for in full by Germany.
While it was not initially known how much ammunition was delivered to Ukraine in June, Czech Minister of Defence Jana Černochová later clarified to the Czech news agency CTK that 50,000 shells were delivered. From now on, several tens of thousand additional shells will be delivered to Ukraine every month to at least partially cover the urgent need for artillery ammunition, said Czech Prime Minister Petr Fiala.
The statement made today by the Czech Prime Minister also confirms an earlier assumption of mine. In mid-April, he announced that although significantly more commitments had been made to date, only 180,000 shells had actually been contractually bound — the exact amount of the German commitment.
In fact, however, it now seems to be confirmed that Germany — although numerous countries made commitments before the German government did — was the first to actually transfer the money to the Czech government, so that the first shells could be purchased and delivered to Ukraine.
Deliveries in the near future will probably not be paid for exclusively by Germany again, but also by other countries. Although, as of the end of May, only five of the eighteen countries that had pledged funds had actually made payments, the German Minister of Defence announced in mid-March that the 180,000 artillery shells financed by Germany would be delivered in several batches by the end of the year.
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Changelog
- 28th of June 2024 — Updated several paragraphs with additional information provided by the Czech Minister of Defence on the same day on which the article was released
