Australia will gift dozens of retiring tanks to Ukraine in a $245 million package aimed at bolstering the country’s defence of the Russian invasion.
The 49 military vehicles make up almost the entire fleet of the Australian Army’s formerly critical Abrams M1A1 tanks, which Defence Industry Minister Pat Conroy called its “armoured fist”.
The announcement came on the same day Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy unveiled what he called his “victory plan” for the war, which includes joining NATO and using Western-supplied longer-range missiles to strike military targets deep inside Russia among its stickier points.
Zelenskyy was yet to comment on the donation but an Australian peak body for Ukrainian organisations thanked the government for “stepping up”.
Conroy said the tanks would deliver “more firepower and mobility” to Ukrainian troops and were just the latest example of Australia’s “steadfast support” for the country.
“Russia is trying to take us back to a world where spheres of interest reign, where only great powers are truly sovereign and their actions are above the law,” he told reporters in London yesterday.
“This is not a world where the people of Australia or the people of the United Kingdom would thrive.”
Ukraine has been pushing to receive the ageing tanks since at least February but Defence Minister Richard Marles previously insisted a handover was “not on the agenda”.
Asked why the donation had taken so long to be realised, Conroy said the timing was “logical” as Australia had begun to receive a replacement model.
“They were the backbone of the Australian Army. They were the Armoured Fist of the Australian Army, and they did excellent service in Australia, and they’ll do excellent service in Ukraine,” he said.
“And obviously, we’re in the process of replacing that M1A2 Abrams, so it’s the logical time to hand them over as part of our support for the armoured brigades of Ukraine as they fight a very intense war against Russia.”
The donation took Canberra’s total military donations to Kyiv to $1.3 billion, with another $200 million in non-military aid.
A handful of M1A1 Abrams tanks will remain behind in Australia to help the transition to the M1A2 models.
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