The United States announced on Wednesday, December 27, the release of $250 million in military aid for Ukraine, their last tranche available without a new vote in the American Congress.
Negotiations are still slipping between Republican and Democratic parliamentarians on the validation of the 61 billion envelope insisted on by American President Joe Biden and his Ukrainian counterpart Volodymyr Zelensky. “It is imperative that Congress act as soon as possible to advance our national security interests by helping Ukraine defend itself,” Secretary of State Antony Blinken said in a statement Wednesday.
The aid released Wednesday includes ammunition for air defense systems and anti-tank weapons, according to the State Department press release. “Thank you for your help, we will win,” reacted the head of the Ukrainian presidential administration Andriï Iermak on X (formerly Twitter) in the evening.
“Short of resources”
However, Senate leaders have already noted that the American Congress will end the year without approving new funds – another disappointment for the Ukrainian president, in a year marked by the disappointed hope of a major counter-offensive and the pressure increased presence of Russia on the front.
The White House had warned that it would “run out of resources” for Ukraine “by the end of the year”. “We only have one envelope of aid left” before the funds dedicated to Ukraine “run out,” announced a White House spokesperson, John Kirby, on December 18. “When it is sent, we will no longer have authorization (…). And we will need Congress to act without delay,” he warned. Volodymyr Zelensky came to Washington in mid-December in person – his third trip to the American capital in a year – to try to increase the pressure.
But almost two years after the start of a war which is getting bogged down – and more than 110 billion dollars already released by Congress – the question of the continuity of this support, “as long as it takes”, to Ukraine, arises with more and more insistence. Republicans, in particular, began to find the bill too high. They had conditioned their support for this new package on a drastic tightening of American migration policy. Negotiations on this explosive issue, however, did not end in time.
Back to school January 8
Aware that the sense of urgency has faded in Washington since the start of the war in 2022, President Biden had asked Congress to combine his request for aid for Ukraine with another of around 14 billion for Israel, ally of the United States in war against Hamas. So far, in vain.
Since the start of the conflict, the Kremlin has been banking on the decline in Western aid, and any hesitation from kyiv’s allies reinforces Russia’s belief that its bet will be a winner.
The failure of Congress to vote for this envelope does not, however, sign the end of United States support for kyiv. American parliamentarians return to school on January 8, and the Republican and Democratic leaders of the Senate have only stated their intention to validate this envelope, which includes a military, humanitarian and macro-economic component. It is in the House of Representatives, which must also approve these funds, that things become complicated. Its new president, Republican Mike Johnson, is not opposed, in principle, to extending American assistance, but claims that it is not sufficiently regulated.