NATO Multiplied Its Shell Production Sevenfold, But It Still Isn't Enough

Introduction: the Alliance's industrial gamble

An industrial transformation without precedent since the Cold War

NATO is undergoing an industrial transformation that none of its members would have deemed plausible before 2022. In four years, annual production of 155-millimeter shells has jumped from roughly 300,000 units to a target of 2 million, according to data reported by the Economic Times on the eve of the Ankara summit. That's nearly a sevenfold increase in four years, an industrial pace that recalls, with all due proportion, the economic mobilization of the last century's great wars.

Impressive as that figure is, it comes with a warning I consider essential to relay without filtering it: even at 2 million shells a year, Western capacity would remain insufficient to sustain a prolonged high-intensity conflict, according to the very officials cited by the specialized press. That's the paradox of this story: we're celebrating a genuine industrial feat while admitting it still isn't enough.

Mark Rutte's assessment: money alone is no longer enough

A warning aimed directly at European capitals

NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte delivered a warning of rare clarity to European leaders: "Cash is crucial, but you can't stop a missile or a tank with a dollar or a euro." That line, picked up by several outlets ahead of the Ankara summit, sums up the Alliance's shift in messaging: after years spent mainly convincing allies to raise their budgets, the urgent question now is whether that money can actually be turned into deliverable equipment.

Rutte stressed the need to "turn the cash into combat-ready capabilities, and fast," a phrase reflecting a kind of open impatience with the structural slowness of European military supply chains, often fragmented across 27 national markets with differing standards.

An industry forum worth billions in contracts

On the sidelines of the summit, a defense industry forum is expected to produce contract signings totaling several billion dollars, according to reporting from Politico and Brussels Signal. This forum, billed as the flagship event for transatlantic defense production, illustrates NATO's determination to turn budget commitments into concrete orders rather than mere political promises.

According to Politico, European allies and Canada have already committed nearly $120 billion in defense spending over the past year, half of it on American-made equipment, a rise that U.S. official Matthew Whitaker called a "good start" while demanding more.

Andrius Kubilius and the language of military haute couture

A comparison that lands

European Commissioner for DefenceAndrius Kubilius delivered one of the sharpest lines of the pre-summit run-up: "We've learned how to raise additional funds. We still need to learn how to spend them...to outproduce, out-innovate, outgun Russia." He went further, comparing Europe's defense industry to "haute couture," in contrast to Ukraine's industry, which has adapted to wartime conditions and can churn out millions of drones despite more than four years of relentless Russian bombardment.

Stinging as that image is for European industrial pride, it reflects a view shared by several experts: Ukraine, forced by necessity, has developed fast, low-cost production capabilities that Europe's traditional, heavier, more regulated industrial machine still struggles to match.

Fragmentation, efficiency's silent enemy

Fragmentation in Europe's defense market remains one of the most well-documented obstacles to a rapid ramp-up. With 27 national markets operating under distinct rules, the economies of scale that would cut costs and speed up production remain largely untapped, a structural problem Kubilius himself acknowledges without hedging.

Germany, however, illustrates a positive trajectory: the share of its military purchases sourced from domestic suppliers rose from roughly 30% to 60% between the 2020-2021 period and the 2025-2026 fiscal year, a doubling that shows a rapid national industrial surge remains possible when the political will is there.

Camille Grand and the doubt that lingers

A question with no reassuring answer

Camille Grand, a former NATO official now a researcher at the Alliance for Securing Democracy, sums up the caution that should temper any triumphalism on this issue: "But does that mean we're exactly where we should be? Probably not." That reservation, coming from one of the most respected observers of transatlantic defense policy, deserves to be taken seriously rather than drowned out by the euphoria of summit announcements.

Grand's assessment aligns with what several think tanks have documented: current production, even ramped up to 2 million shells a year, would remain insufficient against an adversary like Russia, whose annual production some estimates place between 2 and more than 4 million shells, depending on the source and the munition categories considered.

The inevitable comparison with Russian production

This documented asymmetry in industrial capacity forms the central argument for those within the Alliance demanding an even more radical acceleration of investment. Secretary General Rutte had nonetheless claimed in November 2025 that NATO was now producing more ammunition than Russia, a statement not backed by precise figures and partially contradicted by other estimates.

This divergence in assessments illustrates the persistent difficulty of getting a reliable, consensus view of Russian and Western military industrial capacity respectively, a fog that complicates setting realistic production targets for NATO planners.

The central role of the Rheinmetall plant in Lithuania

Infrastructure symbolic of the eastern flank's rearmament

Among the most significant industrial projects in this ramp-up is German group Rheinmetall's new 155-millimeter munitions plant in Lithuania, slated to come online in mid-2026. The facility is expected to produce tens of thousands of NATO-standard shells a year, directly strengthening the industrial resilience of the Alliance's eastern flank, according to an Atlantic Council analysis.

The plant's geographic location is no accident: placing production capacity directly in a Baltic country bordering the Russian sphere of influence sends a strong political and military signal, while also cutting logistical timelines for delivery to the most exposed zones in the event of an escalation.

A model set to be replicated elsewhere

Other similar projects are under study or underway in several member countries, part of an industrial decentralization strategy aimed at reducing reliance on a limited number of production sites, a strategic vulnerability identified since the start of the war in Ukraine in 2022.

This decentralization also reflects concern about resilience against possible strikes or sabotage, a scenario several Western intelligence services now consider a credible threat targeting Europe's defense industrial infrastructure.

The UK and Germany, new manufacturers under American license

A decision announced just before the summit

Days before the Ankara summit, the United Kingdom and Germany announced their intention to produce American weapons under license directly on their own soil, a decision reported by Politico that reflects the drive to bring Western production chains closer to Europe's potential conflict zones.

This announcement is part of a broader push for transatlantic industrial cooperation, in which European orders for American equipment would, according to Rutte, support roughly 110,000 jobs in the United States through cumulative orders worth about $300 billion.

A delicate balance between autonomy and dependence

This persistent dependence on American technology and licensing, however, raises a deeper strategic question several European voices have been asking for months: how to reconcile strengthening European strategic autonomy, often invoked by Paris and Brussels, with licensed production that de facto maintains a strong technological dependence on the United States.

This tension was not resolved before the summit, and it is likely to keep shaping the Alliance's internal debates for years to come, given how divergent national industrial interests remain from one member country to another.

The precedent set by this industrial surge

A lasting lesson for Western defense planning

This munitions production story will, in my view, stand as one of the most revealing markers of this decade: it demonstrates that rapid industrial mobilization remains possible in the West, provided there is clear political will and sustained long-term funding, two conditions that were not in place before 2022.

The precedent set by this sevenfold increase in shell production capacity could serve as a model for other critical industrial sectors, notably the production of missile defense systems or military drones, where similar delays have been documented in several NATO analyses.

The risk of easing off once the urgency feels past

The main risk identified by several analysts remains a relaxation of the industrial effort should perceptions of the Russian threat fade, a scenario Western military history has already seen play out multiple times after periods of acute tension followed by hasty disarmament.

It is precisely to avoid that trap that several voices, including Kubilius's, are pushing for the institutional entrenchment of defense investment, beyond simple annual budget commitments subject to the whims of national political majorities.

Criticism from within the Alliance itself

Voices demanding more transparency on timelines

Some defense officials, cited anonymously by several specialized outlets, accuse NATO of a lack of transparency about the actual delivery timelines for ordered equipment, a problem fueling a degree of skepticism among European publics about the real effectiveness of spectacular budget announcements.

That skepticism isn't unfounded: several contracts announced at previous summits have suffered significant delivery delays, sometimes by several years, due to bottlenecks in supply chains for electronic components and critical raw materials.

The need for independent tracking of commitments

Several European think tanks are now calling for an independent mechanism to track the industrial commitments made at NATO summits, to separate political announcements from deliveries actually completed on the ground, a distinction the general public rarely has the means to verify itself.

This demand for greater transparency ties into a broader concern about the Alliance's long-term credibility with its own publics, whose financial support remains essential to sustaining this exceptional industrial effort.

The direct impact on the Ukrainian front

A dependence that remains critical for Kyiv

For Ukraine, this Western industrial ramp-up remains a matter of immediate military survival. Every delay in ammunition delivery translates directly into increased pressure on the front lines, where Ukrainian forces continue to face Russian numerical superiority in artillery across several sections of the front.

This structural dependence explains why Kyiv follows every Western industrial announcement with particular attention, knowing that its own forces' ability to hold certain positions depends directly on the production pace of European and North American factories.

The Ukrainian example that still inspires the West

Paradoxically, it is Ukraine itself that today offers one of the most closely studied models of rapid wartime industrial mobilization, particularly in the production of low-cost drones churned out by the millions despite constant Russian bombardment targeting its industrial infrastructure.

Several European defense officials, including Kubilius himself, explicitly acknowledge drawing inspiration from this Ukrainian model to rethink some of their own production chains, a striking reversal of roles compared with the traditional dynamic of Western aid flowing toward Ukraine.

The financial stakes weighing on what comes next

The growing weight of defense in national budgets

This industrial ramp-up carries a considerable political and budgetary cost for European governments, who must justify substantial increases in defense spending to their respective publics, sometimes at the expense of other sensitive budget lines like health care or education.

This delicate budget equation partly explains the caution of some European governments about committing to even more ambitious defense spending trajectories than those already announced, despite repeated calls from Mark Rutte and other NATO officials to accelerate further.

The ambiguous role of the United States in this equation

The American posture itself remains a source of uncertainty for European planners: while the Trump administration has indeed pushed European allies to invest more in their own defense, its position on the long-term continuation of the American military commitment to Europe remains open to divergent interpretations depending on the statement and the moment.

This structural uncertainty is pushing several European capitals to accelerate their own defense investments, not out of ideological choice, but out of strategic necessity in the face of real doubt about the durability of the American security umbrella in its current form.

What this story reveals about preparing for a prolonged conflict

Planning that now factors in the possibility of a long war

The sevenfold increase in munitions production reflects a profound shift in Western military doctrine: the assumption of a brief, quickly resolved conflict has given way to planning that now explicitly incorporates the possibility of a prolonged confrontation, potentially lasting years, with Russia or another adversary of similar scale.

This doctrinal shift has concrete implications for building strategic stockpiles, an area where several European countries had drastically cut their reserves after the end of the Cold War, a budget-saving logic now widely viewed in hindsight as risky by many military experts.

A project still far from finished

Despite the real progress documented in this story, several experts agree that rebuilding strategic stockpiles sufficient for a prolonged high-intensity conflict could still take several years, even at the production pace currently reached across all NATO member countries.

This long timeline demands constant vigilance, because it concretely means the Alliance's relative window of vulnerability against an adversary with larger stockpiles will not close immediately, despite the industrial efforts already under way since 2022.

The battle over critical electronic components

A persistent dependence on Asia for certain semiconductors

Beyond shells and tanks, Western military production remains vulnerable to a persistent dependence on electronic components manufactured in Asia, including certain semiconductors essential to the guidance and communication systems of the most modern equipment. This dependence is, according to several defense analysts, one of the least visible yet most critical weak links in the current Western rearmament effort.

Several European governments, including Germany and France, have announced additional investments in domestic production of military-grade semiconductors, but these industrial projects generally require several years to reach meaningful production capacity, a timeline incompatible with today's strategic urgency.

Skilled labor, another bottleneck

A shortage of specialized workers in several member countries

The shortage of skilled labor is another well-documented brake on accelerating military production, with several European factories struggling to recruit enough engineers, specialized welders, and technicians trained to the safety standards specific to the defense industry, according to accounts gathered by several specialized outlets.

This shortage stems partly from decades of disinvestment in technical training pipelines tied to defense, a sector long seen as unappealing to young European workers before the strategic shock triggered by the Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2022.

The Turkish factor and hosting the summit in Ankara

A rapidly expanding Turkish defense industry

The choice of Ankara to host this summit is not neutral: Turkey has, in recent years, developed a fast-growing national defense industry, particularly in the field of armed drones, becoming an indispensable supplier for several NATO member countries and beyond, including for certain equipment used by Ukraine itself.

This Turkish industrial rise reflects a welcome diversification of Western supply sources, partially reducing exclusive reliance on traditional major American and Western European defense conglomerates, while also raising new questions about equipment interoperability within the Alliance.

Conclusion: a real industrial feat, a race still far from won

A record that deserves honest nuance

The jump from 300,000 to 2 million shells a year is, without question, one of NATO's most notable industrial successes since the end of the Cold War. But that success must be presented with all the nuance it deserves: it does not, by itself, resolve the persistent asymmetry with Russian production capacity, and it remains weakened by European industrial fragmentation and by uncertainty over long-term American commitment.

The Ankara summit will offer a chance to gauge whether Western leaders, including Donald Trump, are ready to turn this one-time industrial surge into a genuine long-term strategy, capable of withstanding the political and budgetary swings of the coming election years.

A vigilance that must stay constant

I will keep following this industrial story with the rigor it deserves, documenting both the real progress made since 2022 and the persistent gaps identified by observers as qualified as Camille Grand or Andrius Kubilius, because it is this dual reading, neither naively optimistic nor excessively pessimistic, that lets us understand where Western military preparedness truly stands.

The West has demonstrated its ability to mobilize industrially when strategic necessity demands it; what remains is to prove its ability to sustain that effort over time, well beyond the news cycle of a single summit.

By Maxime Marquette, columnist

Columnist's transparency note

Who I am and my acknowledged biases

I am an openly pro-Western columnist, convinced that NATO's industrial rearmament against Russia is a legitimate strategic necessity. This bias leads me to highlight the industrial progress documented in this piece, while striving to faithfully relay the reservations expressed by experts like Camille Grand.

I am not an expert in military production engineering, and I rely exclusively on journalistic sources and official statements to establish the figures presented in this article.

What I don't know and my method

I do not know with certainty the exact, verified figures for current Russian production, as available estimates vary significantly from source to source, ranging between 2 and more than 4 million shells annually depending on the categories considered.

My method consists of cross-referencing several recognized journalistic sources and official statements from NATO officials, systematically flagging areas of uncertainty rather than artificially settling debates that experts themselves have not resolved.

Sources

Primary sources

Economic Times — More cash, not enough weapons: NATO presses to produce more — June 30, 2026

Anadolu Agency — Factbox: NATO defense spending, where allies stand ahead of Ankara summit

Brussels Signal — NATO will seek to turn defence billions into firepower at Ankara summit — July 3, 2026

Secondary sources

Politico — How Trump is turning NATO into a cash machine — July 5, 2026

Atlantic Council — How NATO's eastern flank is setting the standard for collective defense

Defence Industry — NATO now producing more ammunition than Russia, says Secretary General Mark Rutte

Wikipedia — 2026 Ankara NATO summit