Shortly after Russia invaded Ukraine, the government in neighboring Poland passed a law to more than double the size of its military, and went shopping for weapons.
With President Vladimir Putin’s war heading into its second year, the Polish expansion plan has become jaw-dropping in scale. It includes close to 500 HIMARS or equivalent long-range multiple launch rocket systems, just 20 of which allowed Ukraine to inflict serious damage on Moscow’s military machine.
There are also more than 700 new self-propelled heavy artillery pieces planned, over six times as many as in Germany’s arsenal, and three times as many advanced battle tanks as Britain and France can field, combined.
