Russia ‘continues to pour ‘ill-trained’ troops into Ukraine, Austin says
Mike Brest
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Russia continues to “pour large numbers” of untrained and poorly-equipped troops into Ukraine ahead of an expected offensive, Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin said on Wednesday.
Austin provided remarks on the latest developments in the war on Wednesday following a NATO Defense Ministerial in Brussels, a day after he met with defense leaders from roughly 50 countries in the ninth gathering of the Defense Contact Group, which meets monthly to discuss Ukraine’s latest needs as they fight off Russian aggression.
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“Russia continues to pour large numbers of additional people into the fight,” he said. “And those people are ill-trained and ill-equipped, and because of that, we see them incurring a lot of casualties. And we’ll probably continue to see that going forward. That’s their strength. They have a lot of people.”
“Our goal is to make sure that we give Ukraine additional capability so that they can not only be marginally successful, they can be decisive on the battlefield and in their upcoming offensive,” Austin added. “We’re laser-focused on making sure that we provide a capability and not just platforms.”
A day earlier, Austin explained that Ukraine would look “at the first possible moment” to create conditions on the battlefield to be prepared to “conduct an offensive sometime in the spring.”
“All the partners in the Ukraine defense contact group have been working hard to ensure that they have the armored capability, the fires of sustainment to be able to be effective in creating the effects on the battlefield that they want to create,” he added. “And so we believe that there’ll be a window of opportunity for them to exercise initiative and then change or continue to create the right conditions on the battlefield there.”
The one-year anniversary of Russia’s invasion is set for later this month. Within the first year, Russian forces quickly proved to be paper tigers, facing overwhelming difficulties ranging from poor morale to limited training and inadequate equipment.
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Despite the continued pledge from various Biden administration officials, Austin included, there are factions specifically within the Republican Party that have called for the U.S. to cease providing Ukraine with aid.
“We will continue to try to impress upon them that we can’t do anything and everything forever,” an unnamed senior administration official told the Washington Post, adding that “it was the administration’s ‘very strong view’ that it will be hard to keep getting the same level of security and economic assistance from Congress.”