Photo of Bradley Fighting Vehicles Traveling to Ukraine Raises Questions
Photographs showing Bradley Fighting Vehicles departing the U.S. for Ukraine's front lines have raised questions over the level of publicly available information on the shipment of military aid.
On January 5, the Department of Defense confirmed that it would include Bradley Fighting Vehicles in the next tranche of announced military aid. Bradley Fighting Vehicles are used to transport infantry in combat areas, and the U.S. has about 4,000 of them, according to Reuters.
Pentagon Press Secretary Air Force Brigadier General Pat Ryder said the armored vehicles offer a "level of firepower" and protection that "will bring advantages on the battlefield."
On January 6, Secretary of State Antony Blinken announced more than $3 billion in new military assistance for Ukraine, with the Defense Department confirming that 50 Bradley Fighting Vehicles would be part of this package. The Bradleys will be sent with 500 TOW anti-tank missiles and 250,000 rounds of 25mm ammunition, the department added.
In an updated count of security assistance on January 25, the Defense Department listed 109 Bradleys as designated for Ukraine since the start of the Biden administration.
The Twitter account OSINTtechnical, associated with the Center for Naval Analyses think tank, shared images on January 30 of the donated Bradleys being loaded onto the ARC Integrity in North Charleston, South Carolina. The account provided a link back to the source of the images, the Defense Visual Information Distribution Service, which is backed by the Department of Defense.
Some Twitter users questioned the necessity of showing the details of the transportation, although one social media user responded that it had "been done before so it's not really that big of a deal."
"Fancy showing the actual ship," another wrote, while one Twitter user added to the thread: "[Please] delete this picture – too much intel being provided."
Discussing the images on "The Ron Paul Liberty Project," the former Texas representative suggested that the publicly available information could be a way of "intimidating the Russians" but would likely have the "opposite" effect.
Bradley Fighting Vehicles are tracked vehicles with a 25mm gun, operated by a crew of three. There are several variants of the Bradleys, and the fully digital M2A4 Bradley can transport up to seven troops in a combat zone, according to the U.S. Army.
The medium-armored Bradleys, as well as being equipped with a turret-mounted gun, can also be fitted with a TOW missile system to target tanks and a 7.62 coaxial machine gun.
Laura Cooper, a deputy assistant secretary of defense, told the media on January 6 that the Bradleys would "further enhance Ukraine's ability to conduct complex maneuvers in almost all weather conditions and terrain, especially in the south and the east of the country."
Cooper added that the Bradleys would work alongside the armored vehicles pledged to Ukraine by other Western allies. France had announced they would send AMX-10 "light tanks," and Germany said 40 Marder infantry fighting vehicles would arrive in Ukraine by the end of March.
The Bradleys weigh 80,000 pounds and have a maximum speed of 38 mph. The armored vehicle is manufactured by BAE Systems, and has a range of about 230 miles.
