Almost 18 months into the war in Ukraine, Europe’s defense contractors — flooded with demand for everything from ammunition to shoulder-launched missiles and combat vehicles — face a dilemma. Do they gamble on expanding production, assuming that the war and tensions with Russia will last indefinitely? Or hold back until they get long-term commitments from governments that have spent the past few decades shaving or even slashing their defense budgets?
Well in France the defense historical budget has been voted few month ago and Nexter has already double the ammo production for Ukraine and is expected to double it again before the end of the year (so a 4x the production since the beginning of the war)
I think this article focuses more on the private sector of the arm industry. Precisely the problem is that the ramping up of production has the objective of ending the war in favour of Ukraine, and if it were so all of the industrial expansion that would require would have lost sense since there would be overproduction. On the other hand they are interested if the war gets prolonged, but it wouldn’t make much sense for the Ukrainians. Another interpretetion is that Europe needs not to take care of it and be dependant of the US military industry.
It all comes down for profits for the CEOs of the military industrial complex.