Western military aid to Ukraine, which had run out of steam in recent months, is getting a new lease of life after the United States finally released a new support package on April 22 totaling $61 billion – or 56.8 billion euros – in the direction of kyiv, including 23 billion euros devoted to armaments. Thanks to this new envelope, military aid could return to its early to mid-2023 levels by the end of 2024, the German research institute Kiel Institute estimated this Thursday, April 25.
According to new data published by this Institute, which lists the weapons promised and delivered to Ukraine since the Russian invasion on February 24, 2022, the European Union, NATO countries and other nations such as Australia and Japan had pledged to pay a total of 112.05 billion euros in military aid to kyiv. And this, before this new envelope voted by the United States.
European envelopes spread over long periods
The United States had promised 43.2 billion euros in aid to Ukraine, the EU and its member states 52.4 billion euros. But the European promises are spread over several years, while those of the Americans have all already given rise to deliveries or their amount has been allocated to equipment, in particular weapons. For the moment, the Twenty-Seven have only delivered or allocated 35.4 billion euros in military aid. The amounts of deliveries made or the sums allocated by Europe as a whole are similar, however, with 41.5 billion euros.
By country, the United States is followed by Germany (10 billion allocated out of 18.6 billion promised), the United Kingdom (5.3 billion out of 9.2) and Denmark (4.8 billion out of 8.4 ). On April 24, the British Prime Minister also committed to delivering a new envelope of 580 million euros in military aid to kyiv. But “European aid in recent months has not been enough to compensate for the American blockade, particularly with regard to ammunition and artillery shells,” writes Kiel. “The new American aid voted in Congress” is “therefore crucial”.
From small arms to long-range missiles
It is military funding, but also Western equipment that Ukraine needs. At the end of last March, President Volodymyr Zelensky again urged Ukraine’s allies to “accelerate the delivery” of F-16 fighter jets and transfer additional Patriot (air defense system) batteries. Germany is currently the only country to have announced the shipment of a battery.
After obtaining tens of thousands of light weapons in the haste at the start of the conflict, Ukraine received anti-missile defense systems like the American Patriot during the year 2023 to deal with strikes on its infrastructure and cities, as well as modern heavy tanks like the Abrams American (delivered since the end of September), Challenger British and especially Leopard Germans, reputed to be among the best in the world.
Long-range missiles like Storm Shadow/Scalp (with a range of 250 kilometers) were then supplied by France and the United Kingdom from May 2023, then American ATACMS missiles (with a range of 165 kilometers) used for the first time by Ukraine in October. On April 24, the United States also announced that it had made secret deliveries of ATACMS missiles with an even greater range than previous ones, on the orders of President Joe Biden. Others are included in the first billion in military aid which will be delivered “in the coming hours” to kyiv.
Uncertainty looms for 2025
The new American envelope, “according to our initial estimates, includes around 23 billion euros in military aid” to Ukraine, writes Kiel. “It is welcome support but it does not fundamentally change the situation and will only provide respite.” “If the United States does not approve new aid plans at the end of 2024 or in 2025, Ukraine would likely face insufficient support again in 2025,” said Christoph Trebesh, who heads the institute’s team. responsible for monitoring aid to Ukraine.
EU leaders, for their part, agreed at the beginning of February to provide new financial aid of 50 billion euros over four years (33 billion in loans and 17 billion in donations), long blocked by the Prime Minister. Hungarian Minister Viktor Orban. However, this does not aim to increase military aid but to support the reconstruction and modernization of Ukraine. After the vote in the American House of Representatives, the EU Foreign Affairs and Defense Ministers, meeting on April 22 in Luxembourg, nevertheless also assured that they would continue to provide assistance to Ukraine, without announcing concrete measures. “There are major uncertainties about what will happen next,” warns Christoph Trebesh.