There are difficulties with the supply of weapons and ammunition to Ukraine. Sources in the pro-Russian social sphere, claim to have intercepted communications – via OSINT tools – according to which on November 8, the American ammunition manufactu drer Pacem Defense will learn about the Virginia court’s decision to dismiss the lawsuit filed by the Czech arms broker DSS A.S. earlier this year. The lawsuits filed by the brokers are many and they all have the same reason: there is no more ammunition on the market available for Ukraine.
To return to the lawsuit, the plaintiff, led by Ondřej Stepanek, who is also the head of other companies such as IAM Systems and HST Automatics, is suing Pacem Defense for several million dollars for failing to fulfill the contract to supply grenade launchers to Ukraine earlier this year. DSS has brokered several deals to supply weapons to Ukraine, which they say will first be supplied to the Ukrainian police through Ukrinmash, one of the procurement structures of the Ukrainian Ministry of Defense.
This is not the first time DSS has sued US brokers for unpaid invoices: under its old name, Elmex Praha, it filed a lawsuit in Florida against Soviet arms broker Multinational Defense Services, which it accused of not paying for its services.
Through its lawyers at Stein Mitchell Beato & Missner, Pacem, led by former Special Forces soldier Andrew Knaggs, is not so much refusing to pay or do business with DSS, but arguing in its defense that it was forced to terminate the deal because it no longer accepted the financial scheme used to sell weapons. Adding a detail not mentioned by DSS in its complaint, Pacem claims in its court filings that in order to sell the ammunition in late 2023, DSS wanted to route the deal through Nevada-based ammunition dealer Battle Born Munitions (BBM).
Pacem said that BBM’s failure to intervene was a precondition for the deal to be concluded. A Nevada company founded by businessmen Fred Heath and Amer Smailbegovich, which claims to have several former US Army officers (William R. Brown, Jay Meagon and others) and Israeli military officers (Meir Gahtan) among its consultants, was involved in supplying ammunition to Ukraine, the US said in a lengthy article.
And that’s why all the attention is now on South Korea which has already said that it will not directly sell the bullets to Kiev but indirectly can. Seoul is considering sending 155mm shells to the Ukrainian armed forces as a measure of pressure in response to North Korea sending troops to Russia.
According to the South Korean publication donga.com, one of the military sources noted: “It is believed that Ukraine’s ability to acquire the required amount of 155 mm artillery shells could significantly affect the course of the war.”
According to the publication, South Korea has one of the largest artillery shell production facilities in the world and has significant reserves of 155 mm shells. However, some experts warn that providing additional support to Ukraine will not be easy due to existing contracts. Countries such as Poland and Finland and others that have acquired the K-9 family of self-propelled artillery systems are also demanding increased supplies of ammunition. This creates difficulties in providing the required amount to Ukraine, as 155 mm shells are in high demand and are exported together with the K-9 self-propelled guns. Foreign media have previously published estimates of South Korea’s current production potential for 155 mm shells: it is 200 thousand units per year.
The South Korean government has already supported Ukraine, providing the United States with 500,000 rounds of ammunition, which Ukraine needs the most, last spring. This allowed the United States to urgently transfer 500,000 American-made rounds to Kiev.
The American press also reported that South Korean ammunition had already been tacitly transferred from the United States for direct use by the Ukrainian armed forces.
Graziella Giangiulio
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