Did ya miss it? The US SecDef announced another 2.1 billion dollar aid package for Ukraine

 

The security assistance to Ukraine 🇺🇦 continues.

Today's $2.1 billion USAI package underscores our commitment to Ukraine's defense by continuing to provide additional capacity over the long term.https://t.co/kM1WUUSb1D

— Secretary of Defense Lloyd J. Austin III (@SecDef) June 9, 2023

We have limited visibility of the battlefield (soda straw effect) but we can glimpse and deduce a few things. The main one is that whenever things are going sideways for Ukraine, the Ukrainians will either yell and shout for a particular weapon system (MLRS, UAVs, Close The Sky, Abrams/Leopards, Anti-Air Missiles, recently F-16s etc...) or the Pentagon will step up and send them what they think they need.

In this case they're sending anti-air missiles (have seen some really rough tweets saying that Russian attack helicopters are making a mess of Ukrainian armor) and Puma uavs.

The Pumas are really interesting.  They're used by infantry which seems to indicate (at least to me) that the Ukrainians are having a bit of difficulty locating Russian fighting positions as they advance.

I talked yesterday about that armor cluster of destroyed Ukrainian vehicles and I suspected that they weren't able to orient to where they were taking fire.

The Pumas should be able to help with that.

Consider this another data point to indicate that the Ukrainians are having a rough go of it.