In Britain, the launch of a plant that was supposed to manufacture ammunition for Ukraine was delayed for six months: what is the reason?
16 February 11:22
In the UK, the opening of a factory producing artillery shells, which were to be supplied to the Ukrainian Armed Forces, has been delayed for more than six months.
This was reported by The Guardian, according to "Komersant Ukrainian".
The plant in Gloucestershire, South Wales, was expected to enable Britain to increase its artillery shell production capacity, replenish army stocks, and increase supplies to Ukraine.
Production was scheduled to begin in the summer of 2025, but this has not yet happened.
In response to a request for comment, the plant’s operator, BAE Systems, confirmed the delay, stating that it was caused by a decision made during construction last year to double the plant’s capacity.
“After construction began, we made a strategic decision to double the production capacity compared to the initial project, increasing the production of 155 mm shells by 16 times, which affected the timing of the work,” the company said.
The Guardian writes that BAE produced between 3,000 and 5,000 155-mm shells per year, which means that even the promise to increase production 16-fold will only allow for the manufacture of up to 80,000 shells per year.
For comparison, German arms manufacturer Rheinmetall opened a new plant in 2025 that will enable the country to produce 1.1 million shells by 2027.
Other production facilities
In September 2025, it became known that the German defense company Rheinmetall would build a new shell production plant in a safe region of Ukraine. In January, the company’s CEO said that Ukraine had allocated a plot of land for the construction of the plant.
We also wrote that Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky recently visited the first German-Ukrainian drone manufacturing plant in Munich. He also showed off the first jointly manufactured strike drone.
