More help from EU
The EU will have to double its military support to Ukraine to fill a gap left by the United States after months of blockage of new aid by Congress, an authoritative research institute that monitors Western assistance to Kyiv said on Friday (16 February).
With Republicans in the House of Representatives blocking the approval of $60 billion in new military aid, Ukrainian commanders and Western officials have voiced increased concerns in recent days that Kyiv’s ground forces are running out of ammunition.
In short, should existing US funding dry up, Europe will have to step up, the Germany-based Kiel Institute said in a report on the state of play of military, financial, and humanitarian aid to Ukraine.
“It is highly uncertain whether the US will send further military aid in 2024,” the report warned.
Christoph Trebesch, head of the Ukraine Support Tracker and research director at the Kiel Institute, said that “Europe will have to at least double its current military support efforts in case there is no further support from the United States”.
“This is a challenge, but it’s just a question of political will. The EU countries are among the richest in the world and so far they have spent not even one percent of their 2021 GDP to support Ukraine.”
According to the institute’s data up to 15 January 2024, the United States has sent €42.2 billion in military aid to Ukraine between February 2022 and December 2023, at a rate of around two billion euros a month.
Newly pledged military aid amounted to €9.8 billion between 1 November 2023 and 15 January 2024, the report stated.
In about the same period the previous year commitments amounted to €27 billion, with €21 of this coming from the US.
Current military aid continues to be driven by a few big donors, such as the Nordic countries, Germany, or the UK, while most past donors have promised little or nothing new, the report stated.
The EU and its 27 members in total have pledged €49.7 billion of military aid since the start of the war but so far have managed to deliver or earmarked just €35.2 billion.
Including all Western donors, a total of €265.1 billion has been pledged to Ukraine since February 2022, of which €141.3 billion in financial aid, €107.5 billion in military aid and €16.3 billion in humanitarian aid, the report stated.
The EU and its member states are the biggest donors with €144.1 billion, the United States with €67.7 and the United Kingdom €15.7 billion.
However, the authors of the report pointed out that there remains a big gap between pledges and financial aid disbursed, especially in the case of the EU, which has so far only allocated €77.2 billion, and its pledges are spread out over several years.
A waning of US military aid makes for an even more pressing issue ahead of the US presidential election and a potential second term of former Republican President Donald Trump.
Trump has put question marks over Washington’s continued support for Ukraine’s fight against Russia and recently used his sway to kill a US border reform bill that would have also authorised additional aid to Kyiv.
Trump’s return to power in 2025 would sound the death knell for US aid to Ukraine, the experts stated in the report.
Meanwhile, the authors also pointed towards European divisions over Ukraine aid, stressing that EU military support will be a question of political will.
Hungary’s Prime Minister Viktor Orbán blocked for months authorising an additional €50 billion of aid for Ukraine over four years, a blockage that was overcome only with significant political efforts.
At the same time, in Slovakia, new populist Prime Minister Robert Fico in November fulfilled promises made during his election campaign and blocked a major arms delivery planned by his predecessor.
Fico later sought to reassure Ukraine and the EU that Slovakia would not block EU financial aid for the country and it supported its EU accession.