Ukraine conflict: Germany supplies Dingo armoured vehicles and two more MRLs to Kyiv

Germany is supplying Ukraine with two more MARS II MRLs (pictured) and 50 Dingo armoured vehicles. (KMW)

Germany is supplying Ukraine with 50 Dingo armoured vehicles and two more Mittleres Artillerie Raketen System (MARS) multiple rocket launchers (MRLs), German Federal Minister of Defence Christine Lambrecht said at Bundeswehrtagung (armed forces meeting) 2022 in Berlin on 15 September. She said Germany would provide Ukraine with 200 rockets for training on the MRLs, which are a European upgrade of the M270 Multiple Launch Rocket System (MLRS), according to Land Warfare Platforms: Artillery and Air Defence.

This follows Lambrecht's announcement at the 15 June meeting of the Ukraine Defense Contact Group in Brussels that Germany would transfer three MARS II launchers and Guided MLRS (GMLRS) rockets from Bundeswehr stocks to Ukraine. The United States is supplying Ukraine with the M142 High-Mobility Artillery Rocket System (HIMARS) and GMLRS munitions and the United Kingdom is donating MLRS launchers with GMLRS munitions. The US and UK have not specified how many MRLs they are providing in addition to the initial four HIMARS and three MLRS systems they announced in June.

At Bundeswehrtagung 2022, Lambrecht confirmed German plans to supply Greece with 40 Marder infantry fighting vehicles (IFVs) to backfill for Athens' donation of 40 Soviet-built IFVs to Kyiv, referring to former East German National People's Army BMP-1s supplied to the Hellenic Army in 1993−94.

Meanwhile, Berlin has not given the export approval requested by German defence companies to supply Marders and Leopard 1 tanks to Ukraine, which has been pending since May, German General (retd) Egon Ramms, a former commander of NATO's Allied Joint Force Command Brunssum, told Deutschlandfunk radio on 16 September.