The Biden administration will be sending $250 million more in weapons and ammunition to Ukraine to support its ongoing counteroffensive against Russia.
The military aid package will utilize the Presidential Drawdown Authority (PDA), which means that the Pentagon will take the weapons from existing U.S. stockpiles and quickly ship them to Ukraine. It marks the Biden administration’s 45th drawdown of equipment from its own stocks to Ukraine since August 2021.
The package includes AIM-9M missiles for air defense, munitions for High Mobility Artillery Rocket Systems, 155 mm and 105 mm artillery ammunition, mine-clearing equipment, Javelin and other anti-armor systems and rockets, more than 3 million rounds of small arms ammunition, medical vehicles, and demolition munitions for obstacle clearing.
“The package will help Ukrainian forces on the battlefield and support its air defenses as Russia continues to launch brutal, brutal strikes against the people of Ukraine, including attacks this past week,” White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said on Aug. 29.
The $250 million package is being funded by an “accounting error” that was announced in June, when the Pentagon stated that it had overcounted the value of the weapons that it had sent to Ukraine over the past two years by $6.2 billion.
The error occurred because U.S. military officials didn’t base their calculations on the actual value of what was pulled from the Pentagon’s weapons stockpile and sent to Ukraine but instead accounted for the replacement value of those weapons, according to Pentagon deputy press secretary Sabrina Singh. Newly produced weapons usually cost more than the old ones they replace.
The United States would have already run out of funding for the year to provide additional stockpile equipment to Ukraine, but the erroneous overvaluing of the equipment essentially freed up an additional $6.2 billion in funding.
With the latest package, the United States has sent Ukraine more than $43 billion worth of military assistance since Russia’s invasion in February 2022.
The military assistance has been provided via the PDA or the Ukraine Security Assistance Initiative (USAI), which was created in 2015 in response to Russia’s annexation of Crimea. Under this authority, the United States procures weapons via external defense companies. Packages sent via the USAI take longer to arrive in Ukraine than those sent via the PDA, which arrive within weeks.
Those funds have provided weapons systems such as howitzers and millions of rounds of ammunition to fight back against the much larger Russian military. During the intense and bloody land war, now in its 18th month, much of the ammunition and weaponry has already been used up.
The Biden administration is “confident” that it “will have enough money to meet Ukraine’s need through the fiscal year,” Ms. Singh told reporters during a briefing on Aug. 29.
“But as you know, there’s been a request for a supplemental. And we’re hopeful that the Congress will approve a supplemental package for Ukraine,” she said.
U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken issued a statement on Aug. 29 in support of continued aid to Ukraine.
“Every day, Russia continues to wage a brutal war of conquest that has killed many of Ukraine’s civilians and displaced millions of its people. Their attacks on Ukraine’s ports and grain infrastructure have caused price volatility in food and grain markets and worsened hunger and global food insecurity around the world,” he said.
Ukraine–Russia War Update
While Ukraine has faced challenges in its summer ground operations, it has penetrated Russian territory in recent times, with notable incidents such as the May assault on the Kremlin and multiple drone strikes on Moscow’s civilian sites.Russian officials accused Ukraine early on Aug. 30 of targeting six Russian regions in what appeared to be the biggest drone attack on Russian soil since February 2022.
Drones hit an airport in Russia’s Pskov region near the border with Estonia and Latvia and started a massive fire, the governor and local media reported. More drones were shot down over Oryol, Bryansk, Ryazan, Kaluga, and the Moscow region surrounding the Russian capital, according to Russia’s Defense Ministry.
The airport strike, which was first reported minutes before midnight, damaged four Il-76 transport aircraft, Russian state-owned news agency Tass reported, citing emergency officials.
At least two people were killed in Kyiv amid a “massive combined attack” by Russia early on Aug. 30 using missiles and drones, Serhiy Popko, head of Kyiv’s military administration, said on Telegram. At least two others are wounded, he noted.
“Kyiv has not experienced such a powerful attack since spring. The enemy launched a massive, combined attack using drones and missiles,” Mr. Popko said.
He said several clusters of Shahed drones were fired at Kyiv from different directions. Russia then fired missiles from their Tu-95MS strategic bombers. It was unclear how many missiles were launched.
“All in all, [Ukrainian] air defence forces destroyed more than 20 enemy targets,” Mr. Popko said, noting that the deaths and injuries occurred when debris fell on a commercial building in the Shevchenkivskyi district.
