Finland is the latest country to throw its support behind the Ukrainian riverine force’s desperate effort to harden itself against Russian drone strikes.
Romanian president Klaus Iohannis revealed the Finnish donation in a recent letter to Romania’s parliament, in which Iohannis discussed his government’s support for the boats’ transfer across Romanian territory.
It’s unclear how many boats the Finns are donating—and which type. But it’s obvious what the Ukrainians might do with the craft: reinforce their supply lines across the Dnipro River into the left-bank settlement of Krynky, where Ukrainian marines since October have been holding on to a narrow bridgehead.
The Finnish navy has a lot of armored boats: a dozen 32-ton Jehus, 38 14-ton Jurmos—plus another 17 under construction—and around 20 10-ton Uiskos. The boats transport and resupply troops across Finland’s long coastline.
The Uiskos are the clearest candidates for a wartime giveaway. The decades-old boats are leaving Finnish service as newer Jehus and Jurmos arrive.
But the Uiskos also are the least useful to Ukraine. While they have a Kevlar liner to help stop small-arms fire, the armor only extends along the sides of the boats. Unlike the Jehus and Jurmos with their enclosed passenger compartments, the older Uiskos have open tops—making them vulnerable to attacks by small, explosives-laden drones.
Drones might pose the greatest danger to Ukrainians’ riverine flotilla, which transports marines across the Dnipro into Krynky and also, alongside cargo drones, resupplies the Krynky garrison. In six months of bitter fighting, Russians drones have struck dozens of Ukrainian boats and killed many of their crew and passengers.
The radio-jammers the Ukrainians have set up along the right bank of the Dnipro are their best defense against these drones. But armor protection would help, too. It’s not for no reason that Ukraine has been so keen to get, from its foreign allies, whatever armored boats the allies can spare.
Sweden’s recent $680-million aid package for Ukraine included a whopping 30 riverine boats, including 10 armored CB90s. A squadron of 10 CB90s could land a company of 200 marines “with a degree of survivability for both the craft and embarked troops,” according to retired U.S. Navy officer Pete Pagano, writing in Proceedings, the professional journal of the U.S. fleet.
A Jehu or Jurmo is analogous to a CB90; an open-top Uisko isn’t. It’s not that ex-Finnish Uiskos wouldn’t be welcome in the Ukrainian riverine force. It’s that they don’t represent a major improvement over the rigid-hull inflatable boats the Ukrainians currently ride in—and which are getting hit hard on the short but dangerous trip to Krynky.