>They send almost everything they can outside of nuclear weapons, the most cutting edge military tech, and people (well, outside of a limited contingent of "advisors")
We sent a couple hundred tanks, out of 8k. We sent a couple hundred Bradleys, out of 6k. We sent literally expiring missiles. We sent the tanks missing it's best armor, because we are squeamish about giving away uranium I guess. We sent a few extremely dated F16s, instead of the thousand F35s we have. One of the main ways things were donated to Ukraine was former Soviet powers donating their old trash and getting IOUs from NATO to replace it.
With this sample platter of western equipment, Ukraine has dragged a supposed bear to its knees. With this smattering of 80s vintage, anti-soviet equipment, Ukraine has forced Russia to massively draw down their old soviet inheritance to replace the 2500 Russian tanks lost (plus several hundred essentially donated to Ukraine a couple years ago) and 1000 AFVs destroyed, and nearly 4000 IFVs destroyed.
Like it's not some bombastic victory of course because both sides are so short on equipment that it's basically 1 million men vs 1 million men, and Russia CAN build artillery shells in quantity, so they are advancing at a snails pace in some areas.
But the insane ROI on vintage NATO equipment is hilarious. The Soviets were always afraid of the West invading them, and it appears their opinion was accurate, they would have had a very very bad time. We built this stuff to mulch soviet equipment, and boy were we good at that.
The Patriot is old enough to have been embarrassed during the first gulf war by a SCUD missile. HIMARS/ATACMS is even older. The tanks and Bradleys we sent are the scraps that didn't get upgraded after Desert Storm.
We sent a couple hundred tanks, out of 8k. We sent a couple hundred Bradleys, out of 6k. We sent literally expiring missiles. We sent the tanks missing it's best armor, because we are squeamish about giving away uranium I guess. We sent a few extremely dated F16s, instead of the thousand F35s we have. One of the main ways things were donated to Ukraine was former Soviet powers donating their old trash and getting IOUs from NATO to replace it.
With this sample platter of western equipment, Ukraine has dragged a supposed bear to its knees. With this smattering of 80s vintage, anti-soviet equipment, Ukraine has forced Russia to massively draw down their old soviet inheritance to replace the 2500 Russian tanks lost (plus several hundred essentially donated to Ukraine a couple years ago) and 1000 AFVs destroyed, and nearly 4000 IFVs destroyed.
Like it's not some bombastic victory of course because both sides are so short on equipment that it's basically 1 million men vs 1 million men, and Russia CAN build artillery shells in quantity, so they are advancing at a snails pace in some areas.
But the insane ROI on vintage NATO equipment is hilarious. The Soviets were always afraid of the West invading them, and it appears their opinion was accurate, they would have had a very very bad time. We built this stuff to mulch soviet equipment, and boy were we good at that.
The Patriot is old enough to have been embarrassed during the first gulf war by a SCUD missile. HIMARS/ATACMS is even older. The tanks and Bradleys we sent are the scraps that didn't get upgraded after Desert Storm.