Koch-aligned group launches seven-figure grassroots foreign policy campaign
Katherine Doyle
Video Embed
EXCLUSIVE — The Concerned Veterans for America Foundation is launching a seven-figure campaign to inform the public about U.S. involvement overseas and question the burden-sharing in alliance commitments in Europe and elsewhere.
The group plans to spend more than $1 million over the next year on digital, grassroots, and classroom-style programming to foster a broader discussion about the nature of U.S. defense agreements toward advancing U.S. interests.
“Given the shifting nature of international challenges over the last few years, it’s really important that Americans understand with whom we have alliances, why we have alliances right now with those countries, and how we can improve those alliances for Americans’ benefit, as well as those countries’ benefit,” said John Byrnes, senior adviser at the Concerned Veterans for America Foundation and a veteran of the Iraq and Afghanistan wars. The foundation is funded by Americans for Prosperity, a Koch-aligned group.
IRAN COULD BE ‘CONTRIBUTING’ TO WAR CRIMES IN UKRAINE, WHITE HOUSE ALLEGES
The campaign will focus, in part, on the North Atlantic Treaty Organization and its evolution since the Cold War and will discuss diplomatic routes toward peace and security.
The U.S. has committed more than $100 billion in 2022 to backing Ukraine in the war against Russia, with weapons and economic aid flowing to Kyiv. Yet so much ammo has been sent to Ukraine that Pentagon stocks are running dry.
Under President Donald Trump, NATO members were pummeled to meet spending goals, pressure that has receded since President Joe Biden took office promising to revive America’s overseas alliances. Biden has warned that U.S. support for Ukraine is essential to European and trans-Atlantic security against Russia and launched a push to expand NATO membership to Finland and Sweden.
But Byrnes said there are challenges the public must consider as it weighs U.S. involvement in Europe and as the U.S. continues to back Ukraine in the war against Russia, supplying new weapons to Kyiv and expanding the training of Ukrainian forces.
“Concerned Veterans for America Foundation wants to ensure that Americans understand the costs versus the benefits of every dollar we spend supporting Ukraine over the last year,” he said.
Congress passed a new government funding bill last month that funnels $47 billion to help Ukraine defend itself against Russia’s invasion, for a total of $113 billion in aid since the outbreak of war.
This month, the Biden administration announced its newest military aid package to Ukraine worth a total of $3.75 billion. Washington has also provided long-term military financing to Ukraine’s neighbors, including NATO countries, “potentially at risk of future Russian aggression.”
Byrnes said the costs of a war on Europe’s borders can’t be looked at in a vacuum, citing the potential “trade-offs between continuing to support Ukraine with finances and materiel and balancing rising Chinese power in the Indo-Pacific region.”
“We want Americans to be asking the question of, How is this in our best interest and is there a better alternative, rather than just reflexively saying, well this alliance must be good because it’s always worked, and therefore just keep spending money,” Byrnes added.
Called “Untangling Alliances,” the grassroots effort is a nod to George Washington’s warning against permanent military alliances, a sentiment later enshrined in Thomas Jefferson’s formula of: “Peace, commerce, and honest friendship with all nations; entangling alliances with none.”
The rollout comes as the public is split over support for Ukraine, with changing ideas about Washington’s involvement in the conflict and as some Republicans promised not to provide a “blank check” to Ukraine.
CLICK HERE TO READ MORE FROM THE WASHINGTON EXAMINER
In a December poll by the Chicago Council on Global Affairs, 47% said Washington should press Ukraine to seek a peace agreement as soon as possible, up from 38% in July 2022. Forty-eight percent said the U.S. should support Ukraine for “as long as it takes,” down from 58% in July.
At the same time, about two-thirds of the public continue to support supplying weapons and economic aid to Kyiv, according to the survey.