Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin and Secretary of State Antony Blinken will make the case Tuesday that the United States should immediately send aid to Israel and Ukraine, testifying at a Senate hearing as the administration’s massive $105 billion emergency aid request for conflicts in those countries and others has already hit roadblocks in the divided Congress.
President Joe Biden’s Cabinet secretaries will be advocating for the foreign aid to a mostly friendly audience in the Senate, where majority Democrats and many Republicans support tying aid for the two countries together. But it faces much deeper problems in the Republican-led House, where new Speaker Mike Johnson has proposed cutting out the Ukraine aid and focusing on Israel alone, and cutting money for the Internal Revenue Service to pay for it.
The drastically narrowed House proposal, which would cost more than $14 billion, faced immediate resistance among Senate Democrats – and put pressure on Senate Republicans who support the Ukraine aid but are conscious of growing concerns about it within their party. The differing approaches signal problems ahead for the aid as both countries engage in long-simmering, defining conflicts that Biden and many U.S. lawmakers say could have fundamental ramifications for the rest of the world.
It doesn’t matter if Ukraine gets aid or not, Israel is getting it regardless. Senate voted 97-0 in a “symbolic bill” stating Israel has a right to self defense. Something similar in the House only got 10 no votes. Trump moved embassy to Jerusalem, Biden just gave Netanyahu a big hug. If there’s anything that American politicians agree on, it’s that God’s chosen people deserve everything they ask for.
I think the propaganda and adrenaline over the Ukraine war is finally starting to wear off and people are realizing that Ukraine was never going to win this war.
Do you actually have any evidence to support this claim? At the moment, the consensus is either stalemate or Ukrainian victory according to ISW. Russia getting something out of it is not on the table. Demographics declines, having to resort to weapon reserves, sanctions, etc.
look up the latest article from the Times for some insight about the domestic situation in Ukraine. i thought it was a good read. zelensky is experiencing a lot of internal dissent with a war-weary population. corruption scandals, key advisors criticizing military strategies ( like focusing on political objectives while ignoring military advice), etc.
unfortunately for ukraine, russia still holds 20% of ukrainian territory. ukraine demographics and economy is much more compromised than russia. Russia has more or less recovered from the sanctions with exports reaching pre-invasion levels earlier this year. the rising price of oil has only helped russia stabilize the situation. they’re not immune, with them having to raise interest rates to 15% to try and curb inflation, but the fact of the matter is russia is a big country that can eat itself for a while before it collapses.
much bigger than ukraine
they have basically decided to go all-in after the Israel v Gaza thing popped off. They’ve been throwing bodies at the meat grinder at Avdiivka. Everybody thought they were out of reserves and couldn’t continue - they show that they don’t really care about the losses and are going to push. They’re making ground bit by bit inch by inch.
Look at livemapua, they’re about to encircle the city. does it succeed? who knows. but the main point is that russia can afford to throw offensive after offensive and sit on their ass. ukraine doesn’t have that luxury. if they don’t launch a successful offensive, they don’t get their territory back. and every day that goes by that they don’t capture the territory, russia digs in. they’ve filled land with an absurd amount of mines. it’s hard to fathom the ridiculous stockpile the paranoid USSR had built up of mines, preparing for WW3.
ukraine had the initiative and their counter offensive has failed to achieve any meaningful results besides using up a lot of their resources. now the pendulum swings and it’s unclear whether they survive the winter
russia is betting that western eyes are going to now focus on israel and that this is their chance to make a breakthrough, so they’re slamming ukraine. and russia is willing to sacrifice a lot of manpower to do this. they’ve been pulling people out of jail, literally hundreds of thousands, taking a page from Wagner.
the unfortunate reality is that
a) ukraine could have never beat off russia, let alone win this war, without western help
b) this war is infinitely more important to russia than it is to the west
west has only reached 30% of the production goals for ammo that they set. us aid is already starting to slow. russia and their population is 100% motivated to continue this war because they view it as existential. it’s a war right on their border with the supposed nazis. americans simply don’t view this as the same level of importance. whoever takes it more seriously will win in the long term
ukrainian aid last year was unanimously supported. today it gets debated and questioned. tomorrow it won’t even be a consideration.
also, btw, I’m not sure if you’re reading the same ISW that I am but they do not say Ukraine is winning and sometimes I cannot take them seriously. example from their update yesterday
really? a muslim province of russia riots because Israelis are carpet bombing Gaza and it’s somehow connected to war in Ukraine? All over Muslim world they’ve been storming embassies and having mass protests. Is that connected to Ukraine too?
ISW is a good source but I wouldn’t solely rely on them for a clear picture of what’s going on
here’s their bit about the assault on Adviivka yesterday. and keep in mind ISW has been incredibly conservative about russian advances
I think I would look up ‘political situation in Ukraine’. What this gives me is this article - https://www.wilsoncenter.org/blog-post/future-ukraines-political-consensus .
Approval of Zelensky is pretty high - https://www.statista.com/statistics/1100076/volodymyr-zelensky-s-approval-rating-ukraine/#:~:text=In February 2023%2C over 90,level as in June 2022. . It appears that Zelensky has only 7% disapproval. He’s winning the next election.
And corruption has been cut, and Ukraine is trying to cut down on these.
So, I will have to consider your claims in this quote as false.
That’s a early 2022 statistic. In December 2022, Russia only holds 16% of Ukrainian territory. Who knows what they hold now, 18%?
Source: https://www.lemonde.fr/en/les-decodeurs/article/2023/01/06/war-in-ukraine-russia-now-controls-only-16-of-ukrainian-territory_6010578_8.html
Yes, there is a negative population growth within Ukraine. Thing is Russia is also facing that as well. But, we don’t really know of the long-term. Now, that the world knows of Ukraine, I would be bullish on demographics and economy of Ukraine being better than it was before the war. But, that assumes Russia gives up on the war.
It’s not about the size. Also, bigger size means more strain on logistics. That being said, even if they recovered from sanctions, it is still unlikely they’ll ever return to normal. They’re still experiencing some level of strains due to sanctions.
This I can accept. Avdiivka is similar to Bakmut situation. Russia is throwing bodies after bodies, and number is a quality on it own.
Agreed. Ukraine however did much better than expected.
The west is all in democracy, so Ukraine is important to the West.
It’s debated and questioned alongside Republican side. Democratic people are still all in Ukraine.
(x) Doubt. That depends on how IDF conducts themselves in Gaza. Israel could very much lose all support if they do stupid shit, and then it’ll be back to Ukraine as the focus. United States support of Israel is not unconditional. We do have Democratic people that are critical of Israel governments, and they make it pretty damn clear that if Israel does stupid shit, they will lose all support, and Israel can’t afford to look bad. And there’s questionable history on both ends which points to the question-ability of this tactic.
your article echos pretty much the same thing as the Times one I mentioned, it’s just shorter and doesn’t mention military matters
Polls don’t tell the full story. Last year, when Russia invaded there was a societal consensus that they needed to unite against Russia. All the bad things were blamed on Russia. However, people are getting war-weary. Big promises were made with the counter-offensive that was at first delayed and then when it finally materialized it didn’t achieve anything meaningful. Up until now, the state narrative that’s been pushed has been “we will win 100% and kick the russians out of the country” and that worked for a while. But when you have no military success for a year and tens of thousands of men are dying in an offensive that shows no material gain… people start getting disillusioned. This is what I mean by the adrenaline and the propaganda wearing off.
The article you linked basically summarized what I was saying. Did you read beyond the headline? Beyond that, these aren’t my claims. Advisors and members of Zelensky’s administration are all growing concerned with the situation.
What difference does it make? Russia holds a large chunk of Ukraine and has a) integrated the territory by annexing it and b) dug in and fortified it to the point where Ukraine recapturing is quickly leaving the realm of reality.
Why do you believe this? First, nearly 100,000 men are dead. They’re not coming back. The longer the war continues, the higher this number is going to be, making rebuilding progressively harder. Second, millions have left and become refugees. a little under 6 million. That’s about 1 in 7 people. We don’t know how many will come back, but if I escaped the poorest country in Europe with my family and made it to a 1st world country - I’m not coming back. At minimum a large chunk aren’t coming back.
Now consider the amount of damage that has been done to Ukrainian cities on the frontlines. Many cities have been destroyed. Infrastructure damaged. Towns depopulated. We’re talking hundreds of billions of dollars of damage. And as a cherry, Ukraine’s economy has been cut by a third.
The only reason they survive is because of an IV drip line of both financial and military resources from the West. What happens when the war is over? Sure, there will be some investment and attempts to rebuild Ukraine. But you really think after spending $150+ billion (will be more by the end of this) that the West will be willing to spend 3x that? world bank estimated $350B last year. it’s only gotten worse since then
Realistically, Ukraine has been destroyed for the next century. The longer we prolong this war, the longer the rebuilding will take. It’s honestly so morbid how apathetic our Western leaders are to the suffering of civilians. We are willing to sacrifice Ukraine to hurt Russia. I rather like Chomsky’s quote “we are fighting to the last Ukrainian”
Not as much as Russia. Eastern Ukraine is now effectively Russian territory. Whether Ukraine loses or wins doesn’t ultimately matter to the West in the long term. It is critical to Russia. They will not give up, while our political systems will eventually lose interest. It has just started with the Israeli conflict.
Even support among Democrats are slowly going down. Republicans much more, but America is general is losing desire to continue funding this war.
Unfortunately it is