Special Military Cell Flows Weapons and Equipment Into Ukraine
About 75 percent of the arms are sent to staging bases in Poland, where Ukrainian troops pick up their cargo and take it back across the border. Admiral Heinz declined to identify two other neighboring countries where shipments are delivered, citing security concerns by those nations. The planners use different border crossings into Ukraine for weapons and for humanitarian assistance, he said.

In nearly five months, the center has moved more than 78,000 tons of arms, munitions and equipment worth more than $10 billion, U.S. and Western military officials said.

Many Baltic and Eastern European countries have donated Soviet-standard weapons and ammunition that the Ukrainian military has long used. But given the intense fighting, those stocks are running low, if not already depleted. One factory in Europe is making some Soviet-standard munitions, including howitzer shells, and it is operating 24/7, Admiral Heinz said. The shortage has required Ukraine to begin transitioning to Western-standard weapons and ammunition, which are more plentiful.

Once the weapons are in Ukraine, U.S. and other Western military officials say they are not able to track them. They rely on Ukraine’s accounts of how and where the arms are used — although U.S. intelligence and military officials, including Special Operations forces — are in daily contact with their Ukrainian counterparts, U.S. officials said.

American and Ukrainian officials have downplayed reports that some weapons are being siphoned off on the black market in Ukraine, but Admiral Heinz acknowledged that “we are not serial-number tracking these once they go across the border.”

Russia has attacked Ukrainian train depots and warehouses but has not shown it can effectively strike moving targets — like weapons convoys — with its rapidly diminishing arsenal of precision-guided munitions, American officials said.