Biden administration announces $1.3 billion in long-term military aid to Ukraine
Mike Brest
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The Biden administration on Wednesday announced a new round of military aid for Ukraine that will include critical air defense capabilities and munitions valued at roughly $1.3 billion.
The aid will be provided through the Ukraine Security Assistance Initiative, which means the administration will procure material from defense industries to then send to Ukraine. This type of aid package, as opposed to using the presidential drawdown authority, takes much longer than a PDA package, which would come directly from U.S. stockpiles.
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It includes four National Advanced Surface-to-Air Missile Systems and munitions; 152mm artillery rounds; mine clearing equipment; precision aerial munitions; both drones and counter-UAS (unmanned aerial systems), among many other weapons and support.
U.S. officials have continued to reiterate in recent weeks that their support for Ukraine will not wane even as its war with Russia continues, and even though Ukraine’s counteroffensive has resulted in less success than they hoped.
Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin told reporters he asked allies during Tuesday’s Ukraine Defense Contact Group meeting to “continue to dig deep into their military stocks,” particularly for ammunition, which Ukraine urgently needs. Gen. Mark Milley, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, also attended the meeting and he said afterward that he doesn’t believe Ukraine’s counteroffensive amounts to a “failure,” despite its limited gains.
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“It is far from a failure, in my view. I think that it’s way too early to make that kind of call,” he explained. “Right now they are preserving their combat power. And they are slowly and deliberately and steadily working their way through all these minefields, and it’s a tough fight. It’s a very difficult fight.”
Over the last week, Russia has targeted Ukraine’s port infrastructure after it ended its participation in a pact that allowed significant Ukrainian grain exports to leave the country. The United Nations and Turkey first brokered the Black Sea agreement in July 2022 to correct a burgeoning global food shortage that had been exacerbated by Russia’s refusal to let Ukrainian exports leave for months.