President Biden on Thursday asked Congress to approve $20.6 billion in additional funding for Ukraine, as that country’s military struggles to achieve a decisive victory in its counteroffensive against Russia.
In a letter to lawmakers, the White House Office of Management and Budget asked for $13 billion in new military aid and $8.5 billion in additional economic, humanitarian and security assistance for Ukraine and other countries affected by the war. The White House also is seeking more than $12 billion for disaster relief and other emergency domestic funds, including hurricanes, as well as tens of millions of dollars to boost pay for firefighters on the front lines of the wildfires that have hit many parts of the country. In total, Biden is asking Congress for about $40 billion in new spending.
The funding tied to the war in Ukraine — now nearing its 18th month — is likely to prove the most controversial item. The United States has already directed more than $60 billion in aid to Ukraine, including more than $40 billion in direct military assistance. That is more than any other country. Biden has vowed that the U.S. government will support Ukraine “as long as it takes,” but Western allies face difficult questions about the state of the war effort, with Ukrainian forces bogged down the east despite new Western weapons and training. “The administration is requesting supplemental security, economic, and humanitarian assistance funding that would support Ukraine, as well as countries and vulnerable properties worldwide impacted by Russia’s unprovoked and brutal invasion of Ukraine,” Shalanda D. Young, the White House budget director, said in the request. Senate leaders of both parties are expected to support the president’s request. Scores of far-right members in the House of Representatives have made clear that they would oppose any new funding to Ukraine, but a large majority of Republicans still want to ensure that some money is sent to aid Ukraine and NATO allies, particularly ahead of a blistering winter that could slow the counteroffensive even more. “What you hear from lawmakers is: Yeah, we should support this. But there are some already saying ‘no,’ and some saying, ‘This can’t go on forever,’ which is a reflection of the American public,” said Doug Holtz-Eakin, president of the American Action Forum, a center-right think tank.
Ukraine’s government faces a budget deficit of about $40 billion for this year, but that is likely to be mostly covered by aid from Europe, the United States and other organizations such as the International Monetary Fund, according to Oleg Ustenko, an economic adviser to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky. But that does not resolve what the Ukrainians will do to make up the deficit next year, should the war continue. And tens of billions of dollars in damages to critical infrastructure has gone unrepaired, including for Ukraine’s electrical grid and hospitals. The World Bank has estimated rebuilding Ukraine after the war could cost as much as $350 billion. “There’s still a question mark of what the state of our economy will be next year. If the situation is more or less on the same level as now, we could be required again to need the same budgetary and financial support,” Ustenko said.
Beyond the immediate deficit, Ukraine’s government has an estimated $750 billion in direct economic costs from the war, which could be as high as $1 trillion if indirect costs are added. Ustenko added that Western allies should start transferring billions in frozen assets from Russia’s central bank to Ukraine. Some experts have raised questions about the legality of such a maneuver. “This money should not just be coming from our allies,” Ustenko said. “This money should be coming from the frozen assets of Russia. They have to compensate us. Kremlin is fully responsible for all damage. Therefore even from the point of view of justice, that is very important.” New Russian attacks on Ukraine’s grain exports are compounding the economic challenges. Moscow’s forces have attacked grain storage facilities in July and August, following Russia’s decision to terminate a deal that allowed Ukraine to export grain by sea during wartime. Grain is one of the major Ukrainian exports and a key source of revenue for its government, said Simon Johnson, a professor at MIT who has studied the economic impact of the country’s grain industry. “Putin is playing at the levels of billions of dollars, all trying to convince the West it’s not worth their while to stay with the Ukrainians long enough to evict the Russians from Ukraine,” Johnson said.
It is unclear how the House will handle the Ukraine funding request. The GOP-controlled chamber is already bracing for a major fight over government spending when Congress returns in September, as far-right members continue to push for significant budget cuts. House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) vowed in June that he would not support any supplemental funding, saying aid for Ukraine should go through the regular appropriations process. Asking to tack on Ukraine funding to a must-pass funding bill would likely only inflame the House Freedom Caucus and its allies further — and they’ve already expressed willingness to shut down the government in pursuit of spending cuts. Republicans can only lose four lawmakers within their ranks to pass legislation through their slim majority without Democrats’ help. Two people familiar with the current thinking among Republican members of the Appropriations Committee, speaking on condition of anonymity to discuss legislative strategy, believe the supplemental request would best be tacked onto another must-pass item: the yearly flood insurance reauthorization program, which could put pressure on Republicans to go along with it rather than deny aid to states affected by disasters this summer.
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So when imperialist autocrats decide to violently invade another country, the people who live there should just roll over and accept it in order to not prolong suffering?
No, they should have accepted the first peace offering that Putin offered and Zelensky wanted to accept before his western, corporate overlords told him how things are going to be. This could have ended peacefully in February or March 2020, or anytime in the preceding 7 years since the NATO coup in 2014, but no, western corporate and US interests had to have its blood offering to the capitalists gods. Now people are being snatched off the streets and sent to the frontlines to die needlessly and potentially leading to world wide destruction with Africa and Taiwan in the mix. Oh no! What about the poor shareholders? This is a proxy war, just like the last, and just like the next between then USian, NATO, Western “rules based order” where the global south fully submits themselves to western corporate interests, and a growing BRICS alliance for a more peaceful and mutually prosperous future.
tl;dr if you live in the “west”, like I do, then we are the baddies
There had been 8 years of civil war in Ukraine during which Russia acted as a middleman for negotiations. Both times agreements were reached (Minsk I and II), Ukraine completely reneged on them just days later and started shelling the Donbass again.
And now Banderites pretend that they’re just poor victims as if Putin woke up one day and thought “what if I invaded Ukraine”. Give us a break.
Calling Russia imperialist is an appeal to emotions. There’s only one imperialist bloc in the world and the US is at the top of it, and Russia nowhere near it.
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Half a million children died in Iraq. Was the price worth it? I think yes, coz obviously those children didn’t have blonde hair and blue eyes.
The parallel to Iraq is exactly my point. I’m very anti- bombing kindergartens, and it doesn’t matter who’s dropping the bombs.
So what was the solution after so many years of Ukrainians bombing Ukrainian kindergartens in the run up to this war? (Which was not enough to provoke Putin into a war, btw.)
What would the US do, if China or Russia formed a hostile military alliance with Mexico or Canada, and put ABMs on our border? I think we would destroy those countries right? And rightly so, because you can’t threaten the US.
Watch what Chomsky had to say 8 years ago, and how he predicted the war correctly
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Ni3j1mhU5M
Also, If you are commenting in good faith and If you really want to know what’s going on in Ukraine read this https://www.sott.net/article/466340-Retired-Swiss-Military-Intelligence-Officer-Is-it-Possible-to-Actually-Know-What-Has-Been-And-is-Going-on-in-Ukraine
The source is not mainstream but it contains top citations.
If what the mainstream media was telling, were the truth, then I’d also be wearing the blue and yellow flag on my lapel along with you and shouting Heil Bandera and would advocate for unlimited funding of Ukraine. Unfortunately, almost everything you hear in the msm about Ukraine, is a lie.
I presume you are american? Then why dont you focus your energy on american policy you have a say in? Why not be as outraged at the us military in syria, sanctions on iran, the war in yemen or arming the baku regime, etc.
Is it because you actually dont have a say and in reality the us is as undemocratic as russia?
Russia is not imperialist.
Every time the question comes up of how much ‘aid’ to send Ukraine, the real question for Ukrainians is, ‘How much will we have to give up when the US comes back for its repayments?’
The US isn’t giving anything away for free. It’s hidden in plain sight. Ukraine can have some aid but the implied promise is for the contracts to rebuild $1tr worth of damage. The contractors aren’t going to rebuild those hospitals unless they’re privatised to let the parasites keep leeching off Ukraine forever. They didn’t steal enough when they did this to Ukraine the first time in the 90s.
It’s the surplus capital absorption problem. There’s not much to invest in in the US. The investors know that much of Sillicon Valley isn’t backed by anything real and there’s very little industry to invest in. Those billionaires lining up to buy US bonds to fund ‘aid’ to Ukraine are just looking for some productive assets. Those assets exist in abundance in industrial capitalist countries (and socialist countries and especially industrial capitalist ex-socialist countries).
This is what imperialism looks like. So it’s either ‘roll over’ to Russia and end the immediate war or ‘roll over’ to the yanks and let them loot the place regardless. There’s no option under the current leadership where Ukraine gets to extricate itself unscathed. The leadership made its bet on what turns out to be a shit hand. Now its left with shit choices but its got to take one; but it is a choice – ‘stopping the war’ is not a neutral position as it entails starting a cold war with the west. There’s no ‘rolling over’ about it.
If it were my loved ones dying in Ukraine, I know what option I’d take. I assume you’re nowhere near the battlefield or the fallout to be able to suggest that ‘not prolong[ing] the suffering’ is somehow a bad thing. It’s not a video game. These are human beings being killed and whose lives will be ruined even if they survive.
You don’t sound very curious for someone who started a line of inquiry with “out of curiosity”
They aren’t.
It’s just a
habit, like starting posts with “um” or saying “I like it that/it’s funny that” when being enraged about something.
I was being passive-aggressive in response to their passive-aggressive comments in order to highlight the behavior. I come from generations of WASPs, I’m not putting up with bush league passive-aggressiveness.
Lucille from Arrested Development tier WASP?
Less alcoholism than you usually see in WASP families, replaced by leftover boomer-hippy health fad nonsense. But yeah, you’re not that far off.
I guess I’m just trying to understand what I see as the cognitive dissonace of a leftist rooting for modern-day Russia’s invasion of a neighbor, and this is clearly the place to ask.
Below is a statement released by the folks who run the (excellent and well-curated) news megathread on hexbear:
This is a fairly coherent position. You can disagree with the specifics if you think there are errors or omissions, but if you accept the premise, you can see that there isn’t really any dissonance. There is a fair bit of nuance and discussion about the approach to this argument, and that can be confusing. Ultimately, the war is a gigantic shit sandwich that everyone hates, so arguing about which part of the sandwich is the worst is often not that productive.
The main takeaway, if nothing else, is that there are very few self-described leftists who are pro-Putin, and any support for him is through several layers of support and opposition to a variety of other things. There is a very strong and coherent argument from many parts of the political spectrum against something like sending an indefinite stream of weapons to Ukraine, and if all you can see in those arguments is pro-Putin apologia then I don’t really know that there are going to be satisfying answers here. The dissonance is real, but you’re the one suffering from it. The leftists taking this position are comfortable with it, because in aggregate it holds water. That’s basically the universal experience on the left. Everything sucks, but it makes sense.
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