Lloyd Austin convenes tenth meeting of defense leaders to help Ukraine
Mike Brest
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U.S. defense leaders are meeting with their counterparts from nearly 50 countries on Wednesday to discuss Ukraine‘s latest needs in the battle against Russian aggression.
Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin and Gen. Mark Milley are hosting the tenth Defense Contact Group meeting virtually from the Pentagon and will be joined by Ukrainian Defense Minister Oleksii Reznikov.
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“And as we surge more equipment to Ukraine, we remain focused on accountability — along with our Ukrainian partners,” Austin said in comments to the media before the meeting began. “In just the past three months, members of this Contact Group have shown great leadership in building up the capabilities that Ukraine needs to defend its sovereignty and create momentum on the battlefield, including more than nine brigades of tanks and other armored vehicles.”
Austin said the group “is focused on coordinating one-term sustainment” for Ukraine, which includes finding new donations of ammunition and air defense systems and creating innovative solutions to industrial-production problems.
A day earlier, Pentagon spokesman Brig. Gen. Patrick Ryder said that the meeting “will be another opportunity to bring the international community together to focus on Ukraine’s most urgent needs, to include ammunition. And so again, that will continue to be our focus and — and you’ve heard Secretary Austin and others say that we’re committed to making sure that they have what they need to be successful.”
The war in Ukraine is concentrated around the small town of Bakhmut, which has been the primary battleground for months, but Ukrainian forces continue to fight even as Russia makes incremental gains into the city. The fighting is proving to be more difficult for Russian forces as they approach the city center.
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Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said in his Sunday night address that since March 6, they managed to kill 1,100 Russian soldiers, and another 1,500 were seriously wounded in Bakhmut alone. But Ukraine is also facing heavy losses in the fighting.
A Ukrainian battalion commander in the 46th Air Assault Brigade told the Washington Post earlier this week that after a year of war, his battalion is unrecognizable due to the high number of soldiers killed and wounded in battle.