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The European Union (EU) agreed on Thursday to give Ukraine an additional $54 billion in aid. This will help pay Ukrainian salaries, pensions and other government bills. This will allow Kiev to continue fighting the Russian invaders. EU leaders deserve credit for persuading Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán, a favorite EU leader of Russian President Vladimir Putin, to support this additional cash allocation. But the new EU funding is important for another reason. That would relieve pressure on the United States to shoulder most of the financial burden of supporting Ukraine.
Ukraine is 6,990 miles from the United States, but shares borders with four EU member states. Russia’s war is part of President Putin’s imperial plan to dominate Eastern and Central Europe. This includes at least four of his EU and NATO member states: Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania and Poland. Defeating Russia is essential to the EU’s security.
The EU still pretends that the US should do as much or more than Europe with Ukraine. European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen argued on Thursday that the $54 billion “will also encourage the United States to do its fair share.”
That is an unwarranted disrespect. The United States has provided the most important tool in Ukraine’s defense inventory, the bulk of the munitions needed to continue the fight. This is ignored in most media coverage of the oft-referenced Kiel Institute’s Ukraine aid tracking study. The EU admits it has delivered just over half of the promised military supplies. Also, much of the money promised to Kiev has not been paid. While some EU and NATO members, such as France, have belatedly increased their defense spending, many others, including Belgium, Germany, Italy, and Spain, continue to see NATO as a way to get a free ride on the United States.
The US should support Ukraine. We have a clear interest in ensuring that President Putin’s scheme fails. If he wins, his threat to NATO allies will be enormous. It would be much more likely that the American military would have to fight another war in Europe. The risk of nuclear escalation will increase.
This does not mean that the United States should send all the money and weapons that Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy requests. Corruption remains widespread in Ukraine. Zelenskiy’s government has made only half-hearted efforts to eradicate it. And while his wartime leadership was impressive, his ego continues to undermine the international support Ukraine deserves and needs. These concerns deserve frank attention from the United States.
The U.S. military faces increasing global demands.
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Iran and its proxies continue to wreak havoc in the Middle East. The Iranian government’s actions, including the intentional killing of Americans, threaten a regional conflagration. Next is China. Rising military tensions with the Chinese government are not limited to Taiwan. The Philippines is facing increasingly aggressive harassment in the South China Sea.
America cannot do everything everywhere. Our nuclear umbrella over Europe remains important, as does the continued readiness of the U.S. military to fight alongside our allies against a Russian NATO attack. Still, the U.S. government and military must prioritize the Chinese threat. US aid to Ukraine should continue, but the EU should take the lead, as it did with the $54 billion.
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