US funding failure will have serious battlefield consequences, says Ukraine - Guardian
Zelenskiy aide says ‘foreign policy has become a hostage of internal politics’ after Republicans torpedo aid bill
The repeated failure of the Biden administration to get a funding package for Ukraine approved by the Senate will have real consequences in terms of lives on the battlefield and Kyiv’s ability to hold off Russian forces on the frontline, say Ukrainian officials.
The latest move by Senate Republicans to torpedo a bipartisan bill that would have combined $60bn (£48bn) in aid for Ukraine with aid to Israel and increased border security measures is a bitter blow for Kyiv. It could signal a very grim year ahead as the US political agenda settles into an election year with Donald Trump all but certain to be the Republican candidate.
As the two-year anniversary of Russia’s full-scale war in Ukraine approaches, Ukrainian officials say the delay in US support has already had a clear impact on the battlefield, where Kyiv’s exhausted troops have a severe hardware deficit in comparison to the Russians.
Volodymyr Zelenskiy’s aide Mykhailo Podolyak said Russian troops were using about 10,000 artillery shells a day along the length of the frontline while Ukrainian troops were restricted to using between 1,500 and 2,500 in response. He said the shortage of equipment made long-term planning impossible.
“If you have a clear understanding that in the next three to six months you’ll have a particular number of long-distance missiles, for example, you can plan for which infrastructure targets to hit on the occupied territories. And when you sit here today with a deficit, and with uncertainty, you can only fight a defensive war, and this is a stimulant for Russia,” he said in an interview in Kyiv.
The US ambassador to Ukraine, Bridget Brink, expressed thinly veiled frustration with the stalling of the support package on Wednesday, noting there was a massive Russian missile attack on Ukraine overnight. “There is no time to lose. Ukraine needs our security assistance now,” she wrote on X.
Yuriy Boyechko, the president of US-based aid organisation Hope for Ukraine, said: “Everyone was hoping that US won’t let us down, and now we find ourself at a very difficult place. People are losing hope little by little. We dont have time for this because we see what’s going on at the front. The
more time we give for the Russians to build up their stockpiles, even if the aid is going to show up it might be too little too late.”
“It’s very frustrating; even when it comes to Republicans who were traditionally friends of Ukraine, classic Republicans. They know
now that Trump has full control of the party and many of them are avoiding us,” said one source with knowledge of Ukraine’s efforts to bring around Republicans.
