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Will new US aid be enough to save Ukraine?
Ukrainian forces are having their best week in months, and it won't take place on the muddy battlefields of Donbas, but across the Atlantic.
On Saturday, after months of delay, the US House of Representatives approved $61 billion in new funding for Ukraine, as well as aid programs for Israel and US allies in the Pacific; last night, the Senate approved the package and sent it to President Joe Biden. He said he would sign it today.
The new weapons can't come soon enough.
In recent months, the tide has turned decisively against the Ukrainians on the battlefield, forced to conserve their artillery and air defense munitions. The Russian army has fired five times as many artillery shells as the Ukrainians, and a US commander recently warned that the advantage could soon reach 10 to 1. Farther from the front lines, air defense systems vaunted Ukrainian missiles, which once brought down around 90% of Russian missiles and drones, have become considerably less effective, with disastrous consequences for Ukrainian cities and infrastructure.
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Kateryna Stepanenko, a Russian analyst at the Institute for the Study of War, told Vox that Ukraine has lost about 583 square kilometers (225 square miles) of territory since last October, when the United States began reduce the size of their aid programs. That's not a huge expanse of territory within Europe's second-largest country, but more importantly than the actual ground covered is that Russian advances forced the Ukrainians to waste their precious resources pushing back the Russian attacks rather than taking the initiative, Stepanenko said.
The delay in providing aid to Ukraine has cost us dearly, Yehor Cherniev, a member of Ukraine's parliament and deputy chairman of its defense committee, told Vox. For lack of ammunition we lost [the city of] Avdiivka and a number of small settlements, and also suffered significant human losses. All this could have been avoided if help had been provided on time.
Now that help has been provided, can it stop the bleeding?
Reverse the trend or save time?
The Pentagon, which has certainly had ample time to prepare, would have an initial weapons package ready for approval and deployment as soon as funding becomes available. Although the administration has not yet announced what specific weapons will be sent, Reuters reports that the initial tranche could be worth as much as $1 billion and include vehicles, artillery munitions and air defense munitions. Sen. Mark Warner (D-VA) also suggested it could include long-range ATACMS missiles, a capability that Ukraine has requested since the early days of the war but that the White House has been reluctant to approve due to fears. be used to strike targets in Russia.
But after more than two years of war, will this aid really make a difference?
Yes, that's enough to stabilize the front lines, said Mark Cancian, a retired U.S. Marine colonel and defense logistics expert at the Center for Strategic and International Studies. You will see an almost immediate impact on the battlefield.
This is no small thing considering the concerns expressed recently by observers in Ukraine about the complete collapse of the country's defenses.
Franz-Stefan Gady, an analyst with the Center for a New American Security who recently returned from a study trip to the front lines in Ukraine, said the new aid package was likely to restore a situation closer to that of November 2023, when the Ukrainians had not done so. They must compromise as much on sections of the front line and targets in the rear as they are capable of defending against Russian air threats.
The aid also comes at a good time, as Russia has stepped up its strikes along the front line, likely ahead of further attempts to conquer territory in the spring, when drier conditions will make it easier for military vehicles to maneuver.
However, Gady warns, the package does not address the most critical issue, which is labor. Ukraine's frontline units are suffering from a severe shortage of infantrymen and the government has been reluctant to expand the use of conscription to replenish their ranks. President Volodymyr Zelensky signed a law earlier this month lowering the minimum conscription age from 27 to 25 (the average age of Ukrainian soldiers is over 40), but Russia, with its higher population and its much greater tolerance for large numbers of victims, is still likely. have the advantage in terms of labor.
The optimistic view of the conflict for Ukraine is that further aid will buy it much-needed time. She can hold on this year and replenish units that were badly damaged in last year's disappointing counteroffensive, which would hopefully put her in a better position to push back Russia's gains in 2025. By then, Ukraine will have access to new capabilities, such as F-16 fighter jets and, more importantly, the United States and Europe will have increased their production of artillery ammunition, which will hopefully allow the Ukrainians to reduce the Russian munitions advantage.
But there is a difference between avoiding losing the war and winning it. No one expects this new aid alone to be enough to achieve the latter goal.
Okay, you've stabilized the front. Now what? Cancian said. Ukrainians must answer this question. What is their theory of victory?
The Washington Front
No one should expect Russia to collapse overnight. Even the most optimistic scenarios for Ukraine envisage a long and costly war of attrition. Unfortunately, the long and terribly difficult process of passing this aid bill suggests that Washington may not be so patient.
If the new aid allows Ukraine to simply maintain another battlefield stalemate rather than make significant gains, international pressure on kyiv to negotiate with Moscow could become greater. Ukrainian leaders will counter that they have no reason to believe Russia will honor such a settlement.
As for Russia's own calculations, the passage of the aid bill was an important signal to President Vladimir Putin that there is still strong political support for Ukraine in the United States, even if it's not as strong as it was two years ago. Of course, everything could change next year if former President Donald Trump, who would likely pressure Ukraine to cede territory to end the war, returns to the White House.
Ukraine and its allies reached out to Trump and his allies in hopes of hedging their bets, and in a slightly positive sign for kyiv, Trump ended up supporting the new aid program after it was structured as a loan rather than a grant, an idea he had floated earlier.
But it's safe to say that leaders in kyiv and Moscow will need to continue to keep an eye on the U.S. political climate even as they plot their next actions on the battlefield.
This story originally appeared in Today, Explained, Vox's flagship daily newsletter. Subscribe here for future editions.
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