Czech Republic has given Ukraine all military aid it could – Armed Forces Chief

The Czech Republic began providing military assistance to Ukraine even before Russia’s full-scale invasion and has done everything it could to support the country.

Chief of the General Staff of the Czech Armed Forces Karel Řehka said this in an interview with Ukrinform.

“Actually, the first deliveries from the Czech Republic were shortly before February 24. We started supplying whatever equipment we could even before the invasion started, and since the first minutes we were supporting Ukraine,” the general said, noting that the political decision to back Ukraine was the right one.

According to him, Czech military officials conducted an inventory of mobilization stocks and supplies and identified equipment that could be sent to Ukraine without weakening the country’s own defense.

“We managed to identify a lot of equipment that was later sent to Ukraine based on governmental decisions, because we had a government that supported it. There was a lot of equipment: tanks, BMPs, air defense systems, a lot of ammunition, medical supplies – basically everything you can think of… If I consider equipment support, we basically gave almost everything we could give in those first years,” Řehka said.

However, he emphasized that the military’s contribution was only part of the support, and a much larger portion of equipment came through the defense industry.

The general particularly highlighted assistance provided by industry, the private sector, society, and ordinary people, many of whom continue to donate money to support Ukraine. Řehka himself contributes to an initiative raising funds for drones for the Ukrainian Armed Forces.

He expressed hope that Czech support would continue under the new government. In particular, government has already decided to continue the Czech ammunition initiative.

As previously reported, current Prime Minister of the Czech Republic Andrej Babiš had promised before the elections to stop Czech participation in the ammunition initiative, but at the beginning of this year, he announced that it would continue, though now the Czech Republic will play only a coordinating role.