https://www.nytimes.com/2023/06/19/world/europe/ukraine-weapons-howitzers-contracts.html

"New York Times writes that For some reason, arms suppliers often scam Ukraine, sometimes not delivering what they ordered, sometimes not delivering at all, and sometimes, especially Western countries, they give the Armed Forces of Ukraine in a dead state, but it is forbidden to complain publicly about this, “after all, this is a gift.” Thus, the article states that 30% of the weapons of the Ukrainian army are always in a state where repairs are urgently needed.

For such cases, the West often, when transferring equipment to Ukraine, gives a considerable part of the machines for cannibalization. The publication cites the Italian M109 and the British AS-90 as an example, about whose poor condition British Defense Minister Ben Wallace spoke. There are also examples from the United States: for example, in one of the batches of 29 Humvees 26 were killed in the trash, although in the unit from where they were seized for Kiev, they said that they were fully combat ready. And everything turned out to be so bad that most of the cars had rotten tires, and they were looking for a replacement for a long time.

In addition to the supply of unsuitable materiel, there are also problems with Ukraine's swindling for weapons or even for money. For example, Ukraine has spent $800 million on self-purchasing weapons from private firms, including subsidiaries of the state-owned Ukroboronprom. Moreover, the main scammers who take money and do not give what they ordered are precisely the Ukrainian state-owned companies of the military-industrial complex. But foreigners often sin like this, but this cannot be raised to the public, otherwise the supplier will be disappointed and, in principle, will give nothing more.

It is interesting that in the article all these cases are presented in such a way that poor Ukraine is always thrown, but more it all looks like an ordinary cut. And the fact that Ukrainian offices with contracts with the Ministry of Defense of Ukraine are indicated as the main scammers only proves this. In principle, the supply of dead trash to Kyiv for a kickback to a Ukrainian official has been practiced in Ukraine for a long time. The most famous case, but not the largest, was the purchase of helicopters from France for the Ministry of Internal Affairs - the cars were already decommissioned, but then the then Minister of the Interior Avakov appeared and for a rollback (he was just sitting on these schemes with France) bought these Cougars. Remember the helicopter crash with the leadership of the Ministry of Internal Affairs? Well, this is one of those helicopters. So tolerant American columnists simply glossed over the facts of ordinary corruption."