Ukraine: Inside the Pennsylvania ammunition plant helping the war effort
Five thousand miles from the frontline battlefields, the bowels of a former railway plant in a Pennsylvanian city is an unlikely place to find Ukraine’s war effort in full swing.
Sky News was invited inside a US Army ammunition plant for a tour designed to show that the West is not running out of ammunition.
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Last week, the NATO secretary-general delivered a blunt warning to Western nations.
“The current rate of Ukraine’s ammunition expenditure is many times higher than our current rate of production,” Jens Stoltenberg said.
And so on the production line of a century-old factory, in the rust-belt town of Scranton, American steelworkers are producing round after round of artillery.
We found an industry, increasingly dismissed as obsolete, now in overdrive.
“We’re working as hard as we need to work to meet the requirements of the contracts,” the US army’s boss at this plant, Richard Hansen, told me as we watched red-hot steel rods pass down a conveyor belt.
“We’re working two shifts every day – a solid two shifts every day, 15 to 16 hours a day, five to six days a week and also preparing to increase production incrementally.”
None of the officials at the plant will mention Ukraine itself. Language is carefully controlled; instead the phrases are “matching contracts” and “meeting demand”.
But the contract is Ukraine and the demand is huge. Officials admit that the production of artillery in America has not been this intense since the Korean War 70 years ago.
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Production is at a 70-year high
In this factory alone, 11,000 155 millimetre artillery rounds now roll off its line each month. And yet it is not nearly matching what Ukraine’s army is using.
Between 5,000 and 7,000 artillery shells are used in Ukraine every day. In some of the most intense fighting, they’ve used 10,000 a day.
That rate is set to increase further as winter turns to spring and new offensives by both sides begin. It’s why the US military is investing $2bn to ramp up production in facilities like Scranton.
Over the past several decades, Western military planners and political leaders have been shifting focus and investment to high-tech warfare.
‘I am proud of what we do’
The conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan were against insurgencies; asymmetrical battles where investment in equipment like drones became a priority over tanks and artillery.
Incorrect judgements were made about the likelihood of an old-fashioned mechanical war – a continental land battle.
Russia’s invasion of Ukraine spooked western governments. China’s eye on Taiwan further exposes western capability gaps and future challenges.
In America, Cold War-era factories and old rivalries are being fired up.
“Russia is obviously wrong and we are doing the right thing by supporting them,” one worker told me.
Another added: “Yeah – it’s a busy day right now. It’s been going really good. I am proud of what we do. It’s exciting to be a part of it.”
Mr Hansen said: “It’s an opportunity for local Scrantonians to be able to work for the US government and support the joint war fight so it’s something that they appreciate.”
The Ukraine conflict has proved that a “just in time” ammunition supply chain is unsustainable and stockpiles are shrinking.
But this race against Russia to rearm is time-consuming, expensive and the section of the production line we’re watching in Scranton is the easy part.
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‘We need investment’
From Pennsylvania, the artillery casings are transported a thousand miles west to Iowa where they are filled with explosives and armed with fuses. The raw materials for the explosives are costly.
From Iowa, they are then shipped to eastern Europe.
“It’s a very difficult process, it’s highly engineered, so certainly you don’t wanna ramp up too quickly because quality is the number one aspect, what we look for. Nothing easier without being inspected multiple times,” Mr Hansen tells me.
Russia is not constrained by Western industrial safety and quality standards.
It also has fewer commercial restraints. President Vladimir Putin has switched the Russian economy to a war footing allowing for increased production in an industry typically hampered by inefficiency and corruption.
In Pennsylvania, Mr Hansen welcomed the US government investment in his factory, but his message for the politicians and industrial leaders was clear.
He said: “You need to continue to invest your time and your money into a facility… we are communicating to our leadership, the things that we need here – me specifically at Scranton – need to ensure that we can continue to efficiently produce what we need to produce here.”
Donald Trump has said he is considering “taking away” the US citizenship of actress and comedian Rosie O’Donnell, despite a Supreme Court ruling that expressly prohibits a government from doing so.
In a post on Truth Social on Saturday, the US president said: “Because of the fact that Rosie O’Donnell is not in the best interests of our Great Country, I am giving serious consideration to taking away her Citizenship.”
He also labelled O’Donnell, who has moved to Ireland, as a “threat to humanity” and said she should “remain in the wonderful country of Ireland, if they want her”.
O’Donnell responded on Instagram by posting a photograph of Mr Trump with Jeffrey Epstein.
“You are everything that is wrong with America and I’m everything you hate about what’s still right with it,” she wrote in the caption.
“I’m not yours to silence. I never was.”
Rosie O’Donnell moved to Ireland after Donald Trump secured a second term. Pic: AP
O’Donnell moved to Ireland with her 12-year-old son in January after Mr Trump had secured a second term.
She has said she’s in the process of obtaining Irish citizenship based on family lineage and that she would only return to the US “when it is safe for all citizens to have equal rights there in America”.
O’Donnell and the US president have criticised each other publicly for years, in an often-bitter back-and-forth that predates Mr Trump’s move into politics.
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This is just the latest threat by the president to revoke the citizenship of someone he has disagreed with, most recently his former ally Elon Musk.
But the two situations are different as while Musk was born in South Africa, O’Donnell was born in the US and has a constitutional right to American citizenship.
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Amanda Frost, a law professor at the University of Virginia School of Law, said the Supreme Court ruled in a 1967 case that the fourteenth amendment of the constitution prevents the government from taking away citizenship.
“The president has no authority to take away the citizenship of a native-born US citizen,” he added.
“In short, we are nation founded on the principle that the people choose the government; the government cannot choose the people.”
A farmer who fell from a greenhouse roof during an anti-immigrant raid at a licensed cannabis facility in California this week has died of his injuries.
Jaime Alanis, 57, is the first person to die as a result of Donald Trump’s Immigration Compliance and Enforcement (ICE) raids.
His niece, Yesenia Duran, posted on the fundraising site GoFundMe to say her uncle was his family’s only provider and he had been sending his earnings back to his wife and daughter in Mexico.
The United Food Workers said Mr Alanis had worked on the farm for 10 years.
“These violent and cruel federal actions terrorise American communities, disrupt the American food supply chain, threaten lives and separate families,” the union said in a recent statement on X.
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The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) said it executed criminal search warrants at Glass House Farms facilities on Thursday.
Mr Alanis called family to say he was hiding and possibly fleeing agents before he fell around 30ft (9m) from the roof and broke his neck, according to information from family, hospital and government sources.
Agents arrested 200 people suspected of being in the country illegally and identified at least 10 immigrant children on the sites, the DHS said in a statement.
Mr Alanis was not among them, the agency said.
“This man was not in and has not been in CBP (Customs and Border Protection) or ICE custody,” DHS assistant secretary for public affairs Tricia McLaughlin said.
“Although he was not being pursued by law enforcement, this individual climbed up to the roof of a greenhouse and fell 30ft. CBP immediately called a medivac to the scene to get him care as quickly as possible.”
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Four US citizens were arrested during the incident for allegedly “assaulting or resisting officers”, the DHS said, and authorities were offering a $50,000 reward for information leading to the arrest of a person suspected of firing a gun at federal agents.
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In a statement, Glass House, a licensed Cannabis grower, said immigration agents had valid warrants. It said workers were detained and it is helping provide them with legal representation.
“Glass House has never knowingly violated applicable hiring practices and does not and has never employed minors,” it added.
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