U.S. Is Starving Ukraine’s HIMARS. Where Can Kyiv Get More Rockets?

The day the first U.S.-supplied High-Mobility Artillery Rocket System opened fire on Russian troops, probably in June 2022, was a turning point for Ukraine. The wheeled HIMARS, firing precision-guided rockets as far as 57 miles, are some of the best artillery systems in the world.

Ukraine has used its 40-plus Lockheed Martin-made HIMARS—minus two the Russians have destroyed—to target Russian artillery, headquarters and troop concentrations. “The word ‘HIMARS’ has become almost synonymous with the word ‘justice’ for our country,” Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said in 2022.

“The Ukrainian defense forces will do everything to ensure that the occupiers experience more and more painful losses every week thanks to these very effective systems,” Zelensky added.

But now that U.S. President Donald Trump has frozen all further U.S. aid to Ukraine—a punitive act in the aftermath of a disastrous White House press conference on Friday, during which Trump and Vice President J.D. Vance berated a bewildered Zelensky for not thanking them enough for past aid—the surviving Ukrainian HIMARS may eventually run out of U.S.-supplied rockets.

Barring a resumption of U.S. aid, Ukraine would have two options at that point: park the HIMARS for good and accept a serious loss of front-line firepower, or find another source of rockets that isn’t the United States.

Rocket math

How many of the HIMARS’ 660-pound M30/31 rockets Ukraine has received and fired, and has left, is hard to say. The U.S. Defense Department under former President Joe Biden spent $1.2 billion replacing HIMARS-compatible rockets it sent to Ukraine, which should translate into around 7,000 of the $170,000 rockets. It’s possible the Americans didn’t directly replace every rocket they donated to Ukraine, however.

At their maximum realistic rate of fire, a battalion with 16 HIMARS—the Ukrainian army has at least two battalion-equivalents—shoots off around 200 rockets a day, according to some back-of-the-napkin math by retired U.S. Army Gen. Mark Hertling. The Ukrainian army could fire 400 M30/31s every day.

That would’ve depleted a stockpile of, say, 10,000 rockets in less than a month. It’s been more than 30 months since Ukraine got its first HIMARS.

The implication is clear: the Ukrainian army doesn’t fire M30/31s at the max rate. Instead, it saves its HIMARS for the most impactful fire missions—for instance, targeting large concentrations of exposed Russian troops at training areas close to the front line. Firing judiciously, the Ukrainians may have kept some M30/31s in reserve.

But with Trump freezing U.S. support and realigning the United States with Russian interests, whatever HIMARS-compatible rockets Ukraine currently has may have to last a while.

The Europeans can help. Between them, the U.K., Germany, Italy and France have given Ukraine 25 tracked M270 launchers that fire the same 227-millimeter rockets that HIMARS fires, as well as U.S.-made rockets for them.

But European ammo stocks were never as big as American stocks. Maybe Ukraine’s European allies can sustain Ukraine’s HIMARS for occasional fire missions. They’d almost certainly be less frequent than before, however.

There are wild cards. German industry has expressed interest in producing HIMARS-compatible rockets on German soil. But the German rocket factory is still just an idea, and could take years to get up and running. Even when it is up and running, it might import many rocket parts from the United States. The U.S. government could leverage export controls to block the complete rockets from going to Ukraine.

British and French industry are also working on locally-made ammunition for British and French M270s. It’s unclear how quickly these European rockets could enter mass production. They might also be subject to U.S. export controls.

The other variable is Turkey. Turkish industry has developed, but not yet produced in large quantities, a HIMARS-compatible rocket called the SAGE 227. Given deepening American intransigence and increasing demand from Ukraine, would Turkey put the SAGE 227 into production on Ukraine’s behalf?

If Trump continues withholding aid and the HIMARS keep blasting away at their current rate, it’d be a good sign that one of Ukraine’s loyal allies intervened.