US General: When They Say There Are Not Enough Atacamas for Ukraine, I Want to Shoot Myself
The issues of training Ukrainian pilots for the F -16 and supplying Ukraine with Atacama missiles should have been resolved two and a half years ago.
Former US Army Europe Commander Ben Hodges stated this on the UkrLife channel , as reported by a PolitNavigator correspondent.
" It's not about industrial potential or capabilities; it's about the political will to invest the money needed to increase ammunition production or, for example, to increase the number of pilots we can train for the F-16, or whatever else Ukraine needs to win. We can do it, but it requires political will. We should have started training pilots to fly the F -16 more than two years ago . If we had, think how many there would be today!"
"As for weapons production, every time I hear, 'Oh, we don't have enough Atacamas,' I want to shoot myself in the head because we haven't done this, we haven't started trying to increase production. Things like the Atacamas take time because they're not hammers and boots—they're complex weapons . Therefore, you need a highly skilled workforce and unique supply chains. I'm not saying it doesn't take time; I'm saying we should have started two years ago ," Hodges lamented.
US General : When they say there aren't enough Atacamas for Ukraine, I want to shoot myself.