Brussels, Washington “As long as necessary,” assures Joe Biden, the United States will stand by Ukraine. When he travels to the NATO summit in Vilnius this Tuesday and Wednesday, he will focus on America’s leadership role. The European partners “look to the United States and what we decide, what we do, how we move forward,” Biden said before his departure.
Before the NATO summit, the US President went on the offensive. According to him, the USA is ready to offer Ukraine similar protection as Israel after the end of the Russian war of aggression. Biden related the proposal to the period between the end of the war and a possible NATO membership.
The process for a country to join the western military alliance takes time, Biden told CNN in an interview that aired in full on Sunday. In the meantime, the US could provide Ukraine with the necessary weapons and capabilities to defend itself. However, Biden emphasized that this would only be conceivable in the event of a ceasefire and a peace agreement.
The United States supports Israel with around 3.8 billion US dollars every year – a considerable part of which goes to defense against missiles and military technology.
America is indispensable, people in Europe know that. “The transatlantic alliance is stronger than ever before,” said NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg. EU Commission chief Ursula von der Leyen and Federal Chancellor Olaf Scholz formulate it practically identically.
And they know who they owe their cohesion to: Joe Biden. Under his predecessor Donald Trump, the United States would hardly have been willing to once again assume the role of Europe’s protecting power.
But the United States’ claim to be a leading power, behind which the West rallies in times of crisis, is increasingly being put to the test. So far, the Ukrainian counter-offensive has not brought the hoped-for breakthrough, and 17 months after the Russian invasion there is no end in sight to the war. Signs of nervousness are increasing in Washington.
“The US government has hesitated too long,” Kay Bailey Hutchison, former US ambassador to NATO under Trump, told Handelsblatt. Tactical missiles and stronger air defenses, “Ukraine should have been equipped with these months ago.”
US arms shipments are central to Ukraine’s fight against Russia.
(Photo: AP)
Not only a Republican like Hutchison is of this opinion, her predecessor Douglas Lute, the US ambassador to NATO under Democrat Barack Obama, is also calling for a change in strategy. “The US government has to do more,” Lute told Handelsblatt.
“We urgently need to increase the range of the Ukrainian army so that it can hit headquarters, supply depots and transport in the Russian-occupied territories. For that, it needs precision fire systems and ground-launched missiles.”
According to the former ambassador, the fact that the US government is withholding such weapons “can no longer be justified”. Biden must change his motto: “As long as necessary, that’s not enough. We also need to provide as much support as needed.”
Before the NATO summit: Selenski warns of “dangerous signals”
Biden’s dilemma is that he must constantly balance between overlapping risks. The US government is pursuing a so-called “containment strategy”: on the one hand, the US wants to prevent Ukraine from falling to Russia. On the other hand, they want to avoid a direct military conflict between the West and Russia. This also touches on the question of Ukraine joining NATO soon.
The Ukrainian Ambassador to Germany, Oleksiy Makejev, is pushing for a clear commitment. “At the Vilnius summit, we expect a clear and unequivocal invitation and direction to join NATO,” he said. However, US President Biden does not yet see any agreement among the NATO member states on the subject. If Ukraine were to be admitted, one would also be obliged to defend every inch of NATO territory, he told CNN. If the Russian war then continued, all NATO partners would be at war.
The United States is also stepping on the brakes on certain weapon systems. But a rethink is slowly becoming apparent: the attempted coup in Russia and the skirmishes surrounding the Ukrainian nuclear power plant at Zaporizhia have acutely demonstrated the potential for escalation – and with it the need for a quick end to the war. As was announced last Friday, the United States now even wants to supply internationally banned cluster bombs in order to speed up the counteroffensive.
>> Read here: Controversial munitions – US appears ready to ship cluster bombs to Ukraine
The decision shows the pressure the US government is under, which is being increased by the presidential election campaign. “There are dangerous signals coming from some members of the Republican Party,” Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky warned in a CNN interview last week.
The reason for the unrest is the upcoming budget talks. The US Congress must negotiate a new aid package for Ukraine by autumn at the latest.
So far, the US has been the mainstay of Ukraine’s defense, having committed $113 billion in military, economic and humanitarian funds since the war broke out. The vast majority of MPs and senators from both parties support the transfers, also for reasons of geopolitical deterrence against China.
But because of the exploding debts, defense spending for the coming fiscal year has been capped at $886 billion, with the exact distribution of the funds being decided in the coming months.
A group of Republican isolationists has announced its intention to block aid to Ukraine. Because of the narrow majorities in Congress, they could at least delay the funds and bring about a government shutdown.
“I believe that despite a vocal minority of opponents, there will be enough bipartisan support for aid to Ukraine in the end,” said former NATO ambassador Lute. But there are also other voices warning that the election campaign could develop momentum of its own – and that political support could erode if the Ukrainian counter-offensive fails.
“We cannot assume that US support will continue at the current level,” Charles Kupchan, former European director in Barack Obama’s National Security Council, recently told the Handelsblatt.
>> Read here: “Trying to save Ukraine could destroy it”
The wear and tear in Ukraine is pushing the US arms industry to its limits. Biden has had to tap into US arms reserves more than 40 times.
A miscalculation of $6 billion
Reports of sloppiness have recently fueled resentment. In June, the Pentagon was supposed to provide information on the status of US arms deliveries, and it came out that there was a gap of more than six billion US dollars between the value of the recorded and actual arms deliveries. The US government spoke of a “calculation error”, but the incident triggered a debate about the lack of transparency in the aid to Ukraine.
“That’s incredible,” Republican Senator Josh Hawley told Handelsblatt. “I don’t think we should give Ukraine another dollar at this point.” Hawley and other senators want to send independent auditors to Ukraine to monitor the flow of money.
By the election year at the latest, Biden could come under pressure to push harder for a ceasefire and a diplomatic solution. A majority of US citizens still support their president’s Ukraine course, but skepticism is growing.
After the war began, just 7 percent of US citizens believed the US was providing “too much” aid to Ukraine, up from 28 percent, according to a Pew Research poll.
“It won’t work without the Americans”
European leaders see the US elections in November 2024 as one of the biggest geopolitical risks for the EU. Hardly anyone wants to talk about it publicly, but practically everyone in Brussels is aware that America will remain indispensable for many years to come.
Because the Europeans are not capable of effective deterrence on their own. The Ukraine war revealed that the USA is indispensable for European security.
“It won’t work without Americans,” is the bitter realization of high-ranking diplomats in Brussels after a year of change. “Without the United States, it will be difficult for Ukraine to survive,” Zelenskiy said in his CNN interview.
>> Read here: The re-election of the US president also depends on a solution to the Ukraine war.
At the same time, Europeans are aware of how fragile Biden’s presidency is. German government officials in Washington recently expressed concern as to whether Biden, at 80, was the best candidate to lead the Democrats to victory again in 2024. The US President spoke about Ukraine twice in a row last week, but said “Iraq”.
An election victory for the Democrats, according to the consensus among diplomats, is essential for foreign policy continuity in the White House.
The vast majority of Republican presidential candidates, most notably Trump, reject helping Ukraine and are considered far less pro-NATO than Biden.
“As long as Biden is in office, there will be support for Ukraine,” said former NATO ambassador Lute. “But in November 2024 there are presidential elections. Then everything is up for grabs.”
More: Commentary – Putin’s fate determines Joe Biden’s political future.
First publication: 07/09/2023, 08:23 (last updated: 07/09/2023, 14:22).