Are we beginning to see signs of movement on a major new American aid package for Ukraine that has been delayed for nearly six months? While House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) declined to allow a vote on the Senate bill bundling aid to Ukraine, Israel and Taiwan with measures to enhance control of the U.S. border with Mexico, he is exploring a compromise that would enable a vote on aid to Ukraine. And the latest news is that Congress will take up the aid packages for Israel and Taiwan after it comes back from recess on April 9.
And as a hedge in case Johnson decides not to permit a vote on the aid package for Ukraine, the House is looking at two separate efforts to advance a discharge petition, which would permit a vote in the House on an aid package without the Speaker’s approval. All these efforts suggest that at some point in the next two or three months, Washington will in fact send the aid to Ukraine essential to containing an aggressive Kremlin, which has declared the U.S. to be its principal adversary.
This can happen none too soon. The nearly six-month delay in renewing U.S. assistance has had a baleful influence on events in the war and on U.S. global leadership. It greatly exacerbated the ammunition deficit that made it harder for Ukraine to hold the town of Avdiivka in eastern Ukraine. It brought to the fore concerns in the NATO alliance about U.S. trustworthiness. It has been seized upon by the Kremlin as evidence that the West was losing interest in supporting Ukraine; Russian President Vladimir Putin himself has bragged that if the West stops arming Ukraine, Russia can win the war in weeks.
Fortunately, while Washington has dithered, our allies and Ukraine have been active.
Most importantly, the European Union passed a $50 billion aid package. What’s more, with Czech President Petr Pavel in the lead, the EU and other partners have sourced over 1 million rounds of ammunition on the international arms market and started to purchase and ship them to Ukraine. Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen committed to send Ukraine her military’s current weapons and ammunition because Ukraine is fighting Europe’s war. These measures will reduce in coming months the damage done by the United States’s delay in sending military aid.
Ukraine too has been quite active and, despite the loss of Avdiivka, has done well on the battlefield. First, it has stabilized its defensive position since the withdrawal.
Meanwhile, it has been dominant at sea, and it has been highly effective in the air; Ukraine has used missiles and drones to destroy up to one third of Russia’s Black Sea Fleet. Ukraine has managed to boot Russia’s navy out of Crimea and the western and central Black Sea. This has enabled Ukraine to resume shipping grain and other products out of Odesa and other ports.
In the air, Ukraine’s military has downed or destroyed 20 Russian fighters, bombers and spy planes since Jan. 1. And over the past two months, Ukraine’s missiles and drones have hit at least 12 oil production and export facilities deep inside Russia. These facilities are responsible for 12 percent of Russia’s oil processing capability. It is worth noting that the naval and air drones that have done much of the damage to Russian ships and hydrocarbon infrastructure are Ukrainian made and designed.
Thus, the war in Ukraine cannot be accurately deemed a stalemate. There is a way forward to substantial Ukrainian gains on land too starting in late 2024.
The first step is passing the U.S. aid package. At a minimum, it must include substantial military aid (approximately $45 billion) — there is no substitute for American weapons. But of nearly equal importance is the need for bolder policy in Washington and Berlin.
A key reason for the only modest gains Ukraine made in last year’s counteroffensive was key Western partners’ unwillingness to arm Ukraine to move decisively against Moscow’s fortified defensive lines. U.S. military doctrine and practice would not send our own troops against such lines without substantial air power, armor and long-range fires. Yet Washington and Berlin’s eyedropper approach to sending tanks and fighter jets, particularly F-16s, and their refusal still to send the more effective longer-range fires, such as ATACMs with a range of 300 kilometers and Germany’s Taurus missiles, remain a serious obstacle to Ukrainian gains on land. These items, along with anti-mining and electronic warfare equipment, are critical to changing the tide of this war.
Bold steps in the next several months could equip Ukraine to make major gains in a 2025 offensive. Only major Ukrainian gains on the battlefield can persuade Moscow to back off its current objective of establishing political control in Ukraine. As long as Putin thinks he can achieve that objective, talk of negotiations is wishful thinking.
If Putin were to achieve his goals in Ukraine — especially if it comes from the failure of the U.S. to provide the necessary aid — we should be prepared to face him further west, on NATO territory. The place to stop a revanchist Kremlin is Ukraine, and the time is now to put the necessary pieces in place.
John Herbst is senior director of the Atlantic Council’s Eurasia Center and a former U.S. ambassador to Ukraine and to Uzbekistan. Jeffrey A. Stacey, P.hD., is a former U.S. State Department official; his next book is “Full Spectrum Warfare: Donald Trump, Joe Biden, and the Fight for Global Democracy.”