The war in Ukraine has dragged on for nearly two and a half years now, and so doesn't get the attention that it once did. The fact that it's no longer considered major news is a good thing --- it means that Putin still doesn't have the victory that he thought would take him mere days --- and Joe Biden deserves a great deal of the credit for it, in at least two ways.
First, Biden made the decision not only to back Ukraine financially, but to share U.S. intelligence with Ukraine, making it easier for Ukrainians to find and destroy Russian military targets:
Information about the location and movements of Russian forces is flowing to Ukraine in real-time, and it includes satellite imagery and reporting gleaned from sensitive U.S. sources, according to U.S. and Ukrainian officials who spoke on the condition of anonymity to describe the cooperation.
“The intelligence is very good. It tells us where the Russians are so that we can hit them,” one Ukrainian official said, using his finger to pantomime a bomb falling on its target.
In the early days of the conflict, there was some concern that providing this intelligence put the U.S. at risk of Russian retaliation, but this conspicuously has not happened. It is a key policy measure aiding in the massive damage Ukraine has done to Russia's military.
The other bit of magic the Biden administration managed to pull off was to continue sending aid to Ukraine at all. This fact, too, has been lost in recent weeks, but for a long time, it appeared that House Republicans would cut off all funding to Ukraine (largely at the behest of Putin's pal and GOP presidential nominee Donald Trump).
But in mid-April, Biden managed to get House Speaker Mike Johnson to see reason, allowing an additional $60.8 billion in aid to get sent to Ukraine.
If Trump returns to the White House in January, Ukraine will be lost, strengthening Russia, and making the world a more threatening place for the U.S. and its allies.
No comments:
Post a Comment