As Ukraine Awaits More NATO Arms, Its Improvisations Are Working

Ukraine's mechanics and technicians are improvising as they wait for delivery of more sophisticated NATO weaponry. 

In the interim, they have come up with some clever solutions combining firepower and mobility. Mount an anti-aircraft gun on a long-haul truck chassis: why didnt I think of that? JL 

Jack Buckby reports in 19fortyfive:

With more aid arriving in Ukraine from Western countries, Ukraine’s Territorial Defense Forces (TDF) are finding ways to improvise, reuse old hardware, and improve their firing capacity. Footage shows a single operator sitting on the back of a heavy goods vehicle. A Soviet-era AZP S-60 gun can be seen mounted to the back of the vehicle. The road-transportable anti-aircraft gun, which has been in use since 1950, is normally mounted on four wheels – however, the unit had been taken from its original chassis and mounted to the back of the truck, allowing troops to more quickly move the weaponry on the battlefield.Ukraine Improvises, Mounting AZP S-60 AA Gun to A Truck – Even with more rounds of aid arriving in Ukraine from Western countries, Ukraine’s Territorial Defense Forces (TDF) are reportedly finding ways to improvise weapons, reuse old hardware, and improve their firing capacity as Russian troops continue their carpet bombing campaigns in the eastern region of Donbas.

Video footage shared by Ukraine Weapons Tracker, a popular Twitter account dedicated to sharing information about the conflict in Ukraine, shows how a TDF unit mounted an AZP S-60 57mm AA gun to a truck.

“An AZP S-60 57mm AA gun mounted on a truck used by UA forces- one example of the many improvised weapons appearing recently,” the post reads.

“Given the scale of newly created TDF units, they must scavenge and reuse vintage hardware to provide a semblance of heavy fires capability.”

 

The Ukraine video footage shows a single operator sitting on the back of a heavy goods vehicle. A Soviet-era AZP S-60 gun can be seen mounted to the back of the vehicle. The road-transportable anti-aircraft gun, which has been in use since 1950, is normally mounted on four wheels – however, the unit in the video had been taken from its original chassis and mounted to the back of the truck, allowing troops to more quickly move the weaponry on the battlefield.

While Ukraine may have the upper hand over Russia in terms of weapons supply chains, with a network of Western countries continuing to provide Ukraine with new artillery and weapons systems, Russia recently ramped up its efforts to destroy new weapons arriving in Ukraine.

Last week, Russia’s Ministry of Defense confirmed airstrikes in Ukraine’s capital city of Kyiv. The strikes were directed at tanks donated by Western countries, which were being stored in railway facilities. The strikes occurred at roughly 5am on Sunday.

Five cruise missiles were fired at railway buildings in Kyiv, with only one missile being intercepted by Ukrainian air defense systems.