US aid to Ukraine may be contingent on success of upcoming counteroffensive
Mike Brest
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While Biden administration officials have repeatedly noted their support for Ukraine as it fends off Russian aggression, the future may be contingent upon the success of an upcoming counteroffensive.
The United States and its Western allies have been providing Ukraine with weapons in preparation for this offensive, in which they will look to regain Russian-occupied territory, mainly in the east and south. Accomplishing these lofty goals will be difficult. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has continued to ask for additional weapons, including some that the U.S. has repeatedly declined to provide.
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While President Joe Biden maintains that the U.S. will provide support for Ukraine as long as necessary, there are factions within both the Democratic and Republican parties that want the U.S. either to stop or start explicitly advocating a resolution to end the war.
A group of just under 20 House and Senate Republicans sent a letter to Biden last week advising him that the group “will adamantly oppose all future aid packages unless they are linked to a clear diplomatic strategy designed to bring this war to a rapid conclusion.” The administration has said repeatedly that Ukraine alone will determine when it feels ready to begin negotiations.
Senate Armed Services Chairman Jack Reed (D-RI) said he believes that Ukraine’s success in this offensive could even bolster U.S. support for continuing to arm them.
“One of the things that has, I think, really bolstered support, not only the fact that they’re fighting for our values, but they’re also doing very well, and nothing succeeds like success,” he said on Monday at a Center for a New American Security event. “If they’re successful, I think that’ll help bolster support. And it’s necessary because Putin’s plan is not simply Ukraine. It’s to restore the Russian Empire.”
Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin met with defense leaders last week from roughly 50 countries for their monthly meeting to discuss Ukraine’s latest needs in the war. He said after the meeting on Friday that the U.S. has “met our initial goals to provide what’s required to get started,” and he noted, “We understand that we’re going to have to continue to sustain Ukraine’s effort going forward when the fight starts and long after the fight continues.”
“We’ve enjoyed strong support from the American people throughout for this effort, this campaign, and that support has enabled the Ukrainians to be as successful as they have been on the battlefield,” he told reporters when asked if the public will continue to support the U.S. aiding Ukraine if the counteroffensive doesn’t result in a quick Ukrainian victory.
The Biden administration has provided Ukraine with more than $35 billion worth of military equipment plus training on the more complex weapons systems.
Classified documents allegedly leaked by 21-year-old Jack Teixeira, a Massachusetts air national guardsman, who is now facing multiple charges for removing the classified documents from a secured work environment, taking them home, and then posting the information or photos of the documents online, revealed that the U.S. may not be expecting the offensive to have overwhelming success.
One document from early February, labeled “top secret,” warned that large “force generation and sustainment shortfalls” make it more likely that their offensive will result in only “modest territorial gains,” according to the Washington Post. There’s also a document dated Feb. 23 that provided an insight into the fighting in Ukraine’s Donbas region that predicted a “grinding campaign of attrition” by Russia that “is likely heading toward a stalemate, thwarting Moscow’s goal to capture the entire region in 2023.”
Gen. Mark Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, gave a similar assessment late last month.
“I don’t think it’s likely to be done in the near term for this year,” Milley said. “Zelensky has publicly stated many times that the Ukrainian objective is to kick every Russian out of Russian-occupied Ukraine. And that is a significant military task. Very, very difficult military task. You’re looking at a couple hundred thousand Russians who are still in Russian-occupied Ukraine. I’m not saying it can’t be done. I’m just saying it’s a very difficult task.”
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Should the counteroffensive not yield favorable results, the administration may face scrutiny for not providing Ukraine with fighter jets or long-range missiles, both of which Zelensky has asked for, despite Biden’s refusal to provide them.
“If the counteroffensive does not go well, the administration has only itself to blame for withholding certain types of arms and aid at the time when it was most needed,” Kurt Volker, the special envoy for Ukraine during the Trump administration, told Politico.