(Ramstein Air Base) The American Secretary of Defense promised Tuesday in Germany that his country “will not let Ukraine fail” against Russia and said he hoped soon for a green light from Congress for American aid, expected with impatience by Kyiv.
Closing a meeting of the contact group of Ukraine’s allies, responsible for coordinating military support to the country, Lloyd Austin assured that the determination of the American administration was intact.
“The United States supports Ukraine because it is the right thing to do and because America cares about freedom when it is threatened, but we also support Ukraine because it is crucial to our own security,” he insisted during a press conference at the American air base at Ramstein in Germany.
Exhausted by two years of Russian invasion, Ukraine is struggling against the Russian army, superior in number of soldiers and quantity of weapons and ammunition.
The country is impatiently awaiting American aid amounting to more than 60 billion US dollars (around 55 billion euros) still blocked in Congress due to the reluctance of Republican elected officials supporting former President Donald Trump (2017- 2021), campaigning for a new mandate.
” Optimistic ”
On Tuesday, the head of Ukrainian diplomacy Dmytro Kouleba insisted: Ukraine is “shocked” by the persistent blocking in the American Congress of this crucial budget envelope.
The White House has warned that an envelope of 300 million US dollars (275 million euros) for Ukraine announced last week would only be enough for a few weeks.
To Ramstein, Lloyd Austin, however, wanted to be confident: “I continue to see that both houses of Congress largely support action in favor of Ukraine and I am therefore optimistic about the possibility of future action.”
European countries alone cannot compensate for the lack of additional US aid, even though the EU and its member states have already spent some €28 billion in military aid to Ukraine since that country’s invasion. by Russia on February 24, 2022.
Germany, the leading European contributor to this military support, announced on Tuesday an additional envelope of 500 million euros.
This package includes in particular “10,000 cartridges from the stock of our armed forces” whose delivery “will begin in the short term”, German Defense Minister Boris Pistorius explained to the press.
“It is clear that after two years the war is not unfolding in a linear manner,” he added, referring to the difficult situation on the battlefield. The objective is that “Russia ends up saying ‘We are abandoning our projects’ or ‘I am not moving forward, the effort is too great, the cost is disproportionate'”, argued the minister.
Billions “wasted”
Mr. Austin pointed out that Moscow had “wasted up to $211 billion (€194 billion) to equip, deploy, maintain and support its imperial aggression against Ukraine.”
Washington remains by far the largest donor of military aid to Kyiv, having pledged tens of billions of dollars since the Russian offensive began in February 2022.
In recent weeks, fears of Ukraine’s defeat by Russia due to lack of sufficient weapons have grown, after several advances by Russian forces on the battlefield.
Strong tensions over the strategy to adopt against Moscow have also emerged between Kyiv’s allies, particularly between France and Germany.
For several weeks, German Chancellor Olaf Scholz, who fears the escalation of the conflict, has been under pressure from several of his allies and even within his majority for his refusal to deliver long-range Taurus missiles, because their adjustment would require, according to him, the intervention of German soldiers.
During a tripartite Franco-German-Polish summit in Berlin last Friday, the leaders of these three countries, however, tried to display their unity.
The establishment of a “new coalition of long-range artillery capabilities” in favor of Kyiv was confirmed on this occasion. Its implementation was to be the subject of more in-depth discussions during the meeting in Germany.