The head of the German Rheinmetall announced plans to build a tank plant in Ukraine

The German group Rheinmetall is in talks with Kiev to build a tank production plant in Ukraine that will be able to produce up to 400 Panther tanks a year, said in a statement. interview Rheinische Post head of the defense concern Armin Papperger.

“For 200 million euros, a Rheinmetall plant can be created in Ukraine, which will produce up to 400 Panthers per year. Negotiations with the government there are promising and I hope for a decision in the next two months.” said Papperger (express quote).

Rheinmetall’s shares are said to be “strongly rising”, citing plans to expand the group’s activities as the reason. According to the head of the concern, Ukraine needs 600-800 tanks, and it is possible to achieve the supply of such a quantity if they start production as soon as possible. Papperger believes that hostilities can “last for years”: Russia, unlike Western countries, “does not have many resources”, but so far it is not clear that Moscow “has made any concessions.”

On February 18, NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg said that a Russian victory in the Ukrainian conflict “would be extremely” dangerous for NATO, so it is necessary to continue to support Ukraine. The secretary general also believes that the countries of the alliance should prepare for confrontation with Russia: modernize their own armies, strengthen relations between European countries and the United States, and generally strengthen the “resilience” of Western society.

Against the background of the military operation in Ukraine and rearmament in Europe, the market value of the largest Western military-industrial corporations grew by 21.5% in 2022. Their total capitalization increased from $579 billion in December 2021 to $703 billion in December 2022, Vedomosti previously calculated according to Defense News and Tradingview.

On January 25, Germany announced the delivery of 14 Leopard 2 tanks to Kyiv. German Defense Minister Boris Pistorius specified that the first military equipment would arrive in Ukraine in late March or early April. Poland, Finland, Norway, Portugal, Spain and the Netherlands also announced plans to transfer tanks to Kyiv. In addition, the UK announced the shipment of its Challenger 2 tanks to Ukraine, and the US – M1 Abrams. On February 24, Polish Defense Minister Mariusz Blaszczak announced that Warsaw had sent the first of the promised 14 tanks to Kyiv. According to him, they are already on Ukrainian territory.

The Russian authorities have repeatedly criticized the supply of Western weapons to Kyiv. In particular, the official representative of the Russian Foreign Ministry, Maria Zakharova, warned that pumping Ukraine with weapons brings NATO closer to the dangerous line of a direct military clash with Russia. Russian presidential spokesman Dmitry Peskov said on January 30 that Western supplies of new weapons to Ukraine are leading to a significant escalation of the conflict, but this is not capable of and will not potentially change the course of events.