Today, the Department of Defense (DoD) announced additional security assistance to meet Ukraine’s critical security and defense needs. This announcement is the Biden Administration’s forty-sixth tranche of equipment to be provided from DoD inventories for Ukraine since August 2021. This package includes: additional air defense equipment; artillery munitions; anti-tank weapons, including depleted uranium rounds for previously committed Abrams tanks; and other equipment to help Ukraine counter Russia’s ongoing war of aggression.
The capabilities in this package, valued at up to $175 million, include:
-
Equipment to support Ukraine’s air defense systems;
-
Additional ammunition for High Mobility Artillery Rocket Systems (HIMARS);
-
155mm and 105mm artillery rounds;
-
81mm mortars systems and rounds;
-
120mm depleted uranium tank ammunition for Abrams tanks;
-
Tube-Launched, Optically-Tracked, Wire-Guided (TOW) missiles;
-
Javelin and AT-4 anti-armor systems;
-
Over 3 million rounds of small arms ammunition;
-
Tactical air navigation systems;
-
Tactical secure communications systems and support equipment;
-
Demolitions munitions for obstacle clearing; and
-
Spare parts, maintenance, and other field equipment.
This security assistance package will utilize assistance previously authorized under Presidential Drawdown Authority (PDA) for Ukraine that remained after the PDA revaluation process concluded in June.
The United States will continue to work with its Allies and partners to provide Ukraine with capabilities to meet its immediate battlefield needs and longer-term security assistance requirements.
Given both sides have been seen using the Maxim/PM1910, I think everything is relative. IRC some have even been attached to drones and used to shoot down Iranian Shaheds.
IRC a bayonet charge was used on at least one occasion in Afghanistan, so very very true. Obviously no one wants that, but it’s war. War is messy and as you say shit happens.
Obviously the reality of war is horrible, but I do find it slightly funny that when I was a kid, we used to laugh at pikemen being able to defend a city against a tank in Sid Meier’s Civilisation. The reality of course, is that it’s less far from the truth than you’d initially think (although AFAIK no one’s ever taken down a tank with a pointy stick).
A Japanese WW2 Lunge Mine you say? (And yes, this is yet another suicide weapon Japan actually employed.)