Representational image. AFP
New Delhi: US has been the biggest source of military aid for Ukraine in its war efforts against Russian invasion, but with the Republicans, in the majority in the House of Representatives the cheques flowing off to Ukraine may now have slow flights, if not fully grounded.
On 23 December 2022, the US Congress gave approval to a $45 billion aid package for Ukraine, bringing the total US aid for Ukraine to around $100 billion so far. But the number may not now swell as fast as it did under the Democrat majority in the US House of Representatives.
The Republicans, who won the majority in the House in the 2022 mid-terms, have been sceptical of the aid flowing to Ukraine and have pushed for more scrutiny.
The new Republican Speaker Kevin McCarthy, in October 2022 before the polls, said that there won’t be “blank cheques” for Ukraine anymore.
In a meeting with Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelenskyy last week, CIA Director William J Burns also apprised the war-torn country’s leader that US military aid may not come through as easily in the coming months
The US aid packages should not be seen at the number value alone. The number is the sum of the cost of all kinds of direct and indirect assistance, both military and civil.
Although if one is to go by the total money sanctioned by Congress so far is around $100 billion, only $27.5 billion has gone for military assistance to Ukraine according to the US Department of state since the beginning of 2021.
Most of this military assistance has come through the Presidential Drawdown Authority. PDA allows the US President to transfer military equipment and services already in US defence stocks. Since August 2021, military aid worth $18.3 billion has been taken off the stock for Ukraine.
These drawdowns however have a cap. Initially, it was set at $100 million, which was increased to $11 billion for Fiscal Year 2022 and has now come up to over $14 billion by the 23 December 2022 Additional Ukraine Supplemental Appropriations Act, 2023.
On 19 January 2023, the US announced the 30th drawdown since August 2021 for military assistance worth $2.5 billion.
But given the rate at which these drawdowns have been made the limit will soon be exhausted as Ukraine has been increasingly asking for more weapons to be made available at the earliest, which is only possible by transferring from the US defence stocks. And after that, the President will have to go the Congress to ask for money to aid Ukraine, which is something the now powerful Republicans are not readily willing to do.
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