The Telegraph: Trump Could 'tighten The Screws' On Russian Arms Production
- 13.05.2025, 10:00
Cutting off Russia's last source of tantalum should be a priority for Ukraine's friends.
International sanctions against Russia have deprived the aggressor country's industry of important materials that are needed to produce its best weapons. Among them was tantalum, a rare mineral that is used in many high-tech industries to make capacitors. However, U.S. President Donald Trump's extreme and erratic policies could relieve Russia's military industry of its tantalum famine, writes military analyst David Axe in an article for The Telegraph.
The best Russian cruise and ballistic missiles, drones and tanks are equipped with processors, navigation systems or radios with tantalum capacitors. But most of the tantalum comes from abroad. However, sanctions imposed by the US and other countries have reduced its supply. The main suppliers of this mineral to the Russians now remain the Democratic Republic of Congo, Brazil and China.
"Although Russia has its own tantalum deposits, they are much smaller. Russia lacks modern processing facilities to produce the high-quality tantalum powder needed for capacitors," Ax quoted Ukrainian think tank Frontelligence Insight as saying.
Frontelligence is convinced that sanctions against Russia are actually working. However, will the sanctions regime survive the chaotic and authoritarian administration of U.S. President Donald Trump?"
The Russians are struggling to produce enough new weapons to support the war against Ukraine. However, they do not have enough modern armored vehicles. It is indicated that during the fighting in Ukraine, the occupiers lost 15 thousand units of such armored vehicles. The Russian military first started using old equipment from the Cold War. But even these stocks are being depleted.
Russian troops are increasingly attacking Ukrainian positions in civilian cars, vans and golf carts, or on foot. The switch to unarmored vehicles and "infantry first" tactics has caused average daily casualties to rise to new highs. It is not uncommon for 2,000 Russians to die or be injured in a single day.
At the same time, the Russians are losing control of the air in critical sectors as Ukrainian drones outpace and outnumber the occupiers' Russian drones.
"The enemy has achieved sufficient scale and diversity of its drones and has perfected its tactics for using them," Axe quoted a Russian blogger as saying.
The tantalum shortage is one of the factors behind the decline in Russian arms production. Previously, Russian factories imported processed African, Chinese and South American tantalum from one large facility in Kazakhstan. But Kazakhstan joined the sanctions regime, which cut off the flow of processed mineral powder. The Russians tried to buy more processed tantalum from China, but the quality was low.
Frontelligence reports that Russian industry needs 1,700 pounds (more than 770 kg - ed.) of high-quality processed tantalum per month. To fulfill existing contracts for new weapons over the next few months, Russian factories need more than 4.5 tons of the mineral. However, current stockpiles amount to just over two tons. Frontelligence estimates that "there are no immediate solutions to procure" the remaining two tons.
To fill the gap, Russian industry could buy more "dual-use" tantalum components - those intended for commercial products but also suitable for armaments. But passed from intermediary to intermediary and finally shipped to Russia from countries that have not imposed sanctions, dual-use components are slow to arrive. In addition, they are more expensive than Russian buyers would like. But despite this, they are still coming in.
Cutting off this last source of tantalum should be a priority for Russia's enemies and Ukraine's friends.
"Companies involved in the production or trade of tantalum powder or capacitors ... should face the prospect of losing access to Western markets if trade with Russia is discovered," Axe quoted Frontelligence as saying.
But it is equally likely that sanctions will be eased as the new Trump administration implements an extreme and sometimes bizarre agenda. One of the first actions of the new White House chief was to cut off all foreign aid, including support for Ukraine. In the days that followed, Trump focused much of his energy on threatening Danish leaders in an incomprehensible attempt to annex Greenland as U.S. territory.
Without U.S. support, the analyst notes, there is almost no chance of enacting a tougher sanctions regime that could finally stop the leakage of tantalum to Russia. By doing nothing - or worse, weakening existing sanctions - the U.S. government, which was once the biggest enemy of Russia's military industry, could save the industry from tantalum starvation.