(The Guardian) The Pentagon will rush about $300m in weapons to Ukraine after finding some cost savings in its contracts, the Associated Press reports.
The relatively small input will happen even though the US military remains deeply overdrawn and needs at least $10bn to replenish all the weapons it has pulled from its stocks to help Kyiv in its desperate fight against Russia, the White House announced a little earlier.
It’s the Pentagon’s first announced security package for Ukraine since December, when it acknowledged it was out of replenishment funds. It wasn’t until recent days that officials publicly acknowledged they weren’t just out of replenishment funds, but overdrawn.
The announcement comes as Ukraine is running dangerously low on munitions and efforts to get fresh funds for weapons have stalled in the House because of Republican opposition. US officials have insisted for months that the United States wouldn’t be able to resume weapons deliveries until Congress provided additional replenishment funds, which are part of a large supplemental package stalled in Congress.
National security adviser Jake Sullivan, in announcing the $300m in additional aid: When Russian troops advance and its guns fire, Ukraine does not have enough ammunition to fire back.
The aid announcement comes as Polish leaders are in Washington to press the US to break its impasse over replenishing funds for Ukraine at a critical moment in the war. Poland’s president, Andrzej Duda, met on Tuesday with Democratic and Republican leaders in the House and Senate and was to meet with Joe Biden later in the day.
The US House speaker, Mike Johnson, has so far refused to bring the $95bn package, which includes aid for Ukraine, Israel and Taiwan, to the floor.
The relatively small input will happen even though the US military remains deeply overdrawn and needs at least $10bn to replenish all the weapons it has pulled from its stocks to help Kyiv in its desperate fight against Russia, the White House announced a little earlier.
It’s the Pentagon’s first announced security package for Ukraine since December, when it acknowledged it was out of replenishment funds. It wasn’t until recent days that officials publicly acknowledged they weren’t just out of replenishment funds, but overdrawn.
The announcement comes as Ukraine is running dangerously low on munitions and efforts to get fresh funds for weapons have stalled in the House because of Republican opposition. US officials have insisted for months that the United States wouldn’t be able to resume weapons deliveries until Congress provided additional replenishment funds, which are part of a large supplemental package stalled in Congress.
National security adviser Jake Sullivan, in announcing the $300m in additional aid: When Russian troops advance and its guns fire, Ukraine does not have enough ammunition to fire back.
The aid announcement comes as Polish leaders are in Washington to press the US to break its impasse over replenishing funds for Ukraine at a critical moment in the war. Poland’s president, Andrzej Duda, met on Tuesday with Democratic and Republican leaders in the House and Senate and was to meet with Joe Biden later in the day.
The US House speaker, Mike Johnson, has so far refused to bring the $95bn package, which includes aid for Ukraine, Israel and Taiwan, to the floor.
