An American sniper defending Ukraine revealed: the Russians are being destroyed with Soviet weapons, which they take away from them

Jonathan Poquette is fighting in Ukraine and said his unit prefers AK-74 rifles, which are chambered for 5.45×39mm ammunition.

“The reason why our particular unit preferred AK-74 weapons is that this weapon system is abundant among Ukrainians and Russians,” he said.

He said that this type of ammunition is more likely to be found in Ukrainian positions because many Ukrainians fight with this rifle. Ukraine, once a part of the Soviet Union, is fighting back using a lot of Soviet-era weaponry that has long been in the country.

Mr Poquette said there were of course other ways to get the ammunition he needed, explaining that “if you go and attack a Russian position and you need to resupply, the Russians will usually have 5.45 caliber ammunition”.

Ukrainian soldiers have much older rifles

Mr. Poquette is a member of Chosen Company, a combat unit of the 59th Motorized Brigade of the Ukrainian Army. This force is technically an intelligence unit, but it also conducts both frontline offensive operations and defensive operations. The sniper was injured in January and has been recuperating and training in Kyiv, the capital of Ukraine, since the incident.

He said that Ukrainian soldiers have much older rifles.

“The West has given away a lot of Western rifles that use 5.56 caliber cartridges,” Mr. Poquette said, referring to the standard 5.56X45mm NATO cartridge. “But the problem is that the Ukrainians have not necessarily consolidated these weapons platforms very well in certain areas.”

The Ukrainians are fighting with the help of the weapons left by the Russians themselves

Ukraine used captured Russian tanks and weaponry to repel the Russian invasion. It was also ammunition left behind by defeated Russian soldiers or left behind by fleeing Russians.

The Kalashnikov assault rifle AK-74 was first developed in the 1970s, and its updated version AK-74M was first adopted by the Russian army in 1991.

According to the gun manufacturer, the latter is still widely used throughout the Russian military as a standard service rifle.