For the fourth time since a $95 billion foreign aid bill was passed in April, the Pentagon is sending a weapons package to Ukraine.
In a statement, the Pentagon said the aid, valued at $275 million, “will provide Ukraine with additional capabilities to meet its most urgent battlefield needs, such as: additional precision strike rockets for Artillery Rocket Systems High Mobility (HIMARS); artillery rounds; air-dropped munitions; and anti-tank weapons.”
The installment will arrive at a precarious time for Kiev. This month, Russia began a new offensive around Kharkiv, Ukraine’s second-largest city, which is close to its eastern border.
CQ Brown, the top US military official, said at a press conference this week that Moscow’s goal was to “establish a shallow buffer zone” on that border and force Kiev to decide which areas along the more than 600-mile front to defend.
This package, like two of the others since April, will deplete American arsenals and send them directly to Ukraine. The method is faster than the massive $6 billion in long-term aid announced last month, which, depending on the weapon, could take years to arrive.
In another interview organized by the Atlantic Council this week, Brown said the US was providing Ukraine with a “steady flow of capability” and would focus on what “Ukraine tells us it needs.”
More recently this has not been a piece of hardware, but a way of using already supplied kit. Ukraine has been campaigning to use US-donated weapons – such as the long-range ATACMS missile – to attack Russian territory.
The US is reportedly considering whether to change its policy, which does not allow its weapons to be fired across the border. At the press conference, Brown said he was confident that Ukraine did not use ATACMS to fire inside Russia.
Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin, speaking at his side, predicted that American policy will remain the same.
“Their focus should be on the close fight,” Austin said of Ukraine.
