The $60 billion package of U.S. aid stuck in Congress wouldn’t “fundamentally change the reality” on the ground in Ukraine, Sen. J.D. Vance (R-OH) argued Sunday at an international security conference in Munich, Germany.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris and others are demanding passage of the aid without hinderance at the 60th Munich Security Conference, which coincided with Ukraine withdrawing troops from the eastern city of Avdiivka after months of intense combat, AP reports.
But Vance told the final day of the conference, an annual gathering of security and foreign policy officials, “the problem in Ukraine … is that there’s no clear end point” and the U.S. simply doesn’t make enough weapons to support endless wars in eastern Europe, the Middle East and “potentially a contingency in East Asia.”
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House Speaker Mike Johnson insists he won’t be “rushed” into approving the $95.3 billion foreign aid package from the Senate that includes the help for Ukraine, but the bill has been held up by Republican opposition over its lack of funding and support for U.S. border security.
Johnson said he had requested a meeting with President Joe Biden months ago on these issues, and was still waiting for the opportunity to talk one-on-one.
If the package goes through, “that is not going to fundamentally change the reality on the battlefield,” Vance argued, pointing to limited American manufacturing capacity.
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He then set out, “Can we send the level of weaponry we’ve sent for the last 18 months?. We simply cannot. No matter how many checks the U.S. Congress writes, we are limited there.”
Vance continued, “I think what’s reasonable to accomplish is some negotiated peace,” he said, arguing Russia, Ukraine, Europe and the U.S. all have an incentive to come to the table now and that the two-year-old war will at some point end in a negotiated peace, the AP report notes.
Ricarda Lang, a co-leader of one of Germany’s governing parties, the Greens, countered that Russian President Vladimir Putin has shown repeatedly “that he has no interest in peace at the moment.”
J.D. Vance (l-r), U.S. Senator, Ricarda Lang, Federal Chairwoman of Bündnis 90/Die Grünen, David Lammy, British politician, Priyanka Chaturvedi, Indian politician and Nathalie Tocci, moderator, recorded on the last day of the 60th Munich Security Conference at the Hotel Bayerischer Hof. (Tobias Hase/picture alliance via Getty Images)
Halting weapons supplies to Ukraine now would mean “either you are prolonging the war or you give up Ukraine and Putin wins,” she claimed.
Speaking separately at the same conference, NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg said Congress’ delay has meant the flow of U.S. weapons and ammunition dropped, with a direct impact on the front line.
“Every week we wait means that there will be more people killed on the front line in Ukraine,” he said.
