According to him, it would be difficult for Western allies to raise two full battalions of Leopard 2 tanks to send them to Ukraine as promised.
Germany and Portugal are the only two countries that have pledged to send the Leopard 2A6 to Ukraine: 14 tanks have been pledged by the government in Berlin and three by Portugal: "We will not reach the size of a battalion," he said.
Read more: Ukrainian Tankers Started Training on Leopard 2 in Poland
As Pistorius states, Poland has put together about 30 pieces of the old version of the Leopard 2, which is almost enough for a standard Ukrainian battalion of 31 tanks. However, many of those are in poor condition and need repairs before they may be deployed. He added that these tanks will arrive in Ukraine only at the end of April.
At the end of January, German Chancellor Olaf Scholz said that Germany and its allies would quickly form two battalions of main battle tanks for Ukraine, and the United States promised to send 31 units of M1 Abrams tanks.
On 14 February, Lloyd Austin, US Secretary of Defence, named the countries that had begun preparations to provide Leopard 2 battle tanks to Ukraine or made a commitment to do so.
The Netherlands, Denmark, and Germany have agreed to cooperate in order to supply about a hundred Leopard 1 tanks from industrial warehouses in Germany to Ukraine.
After meeting with his German counterpart in Kyiv, Oleksii Reznikov, the Ukrainian Defence Minister, announced that Ukraine should receive 80 Leopard 1 tanks by the end of the year, and the first two dozen should arrive "before summer".
Read more: The Reason Why Holland Cannot Give Leopard 2 to Ukraine, And What Dutch Army's Integration into Bundeswehr Has to Deal With It
