Russia-Ukraine war: who will finance Ukraine’s defence?
With Ukrainian officials warning the country lacks the arms to defend itself as Russia pushes its offensive, the US Congress has finally announced plans to bring a package on military aid for Ukraine – which has stalled for months due to Republican scepticism – to a vote in the House of Representatives.
What is the new US plan to help Ukraine?
The Republican speaker of the House, Mike Johnson, has proposed to split the $95bn aid bill that was originally passed by the Senate in a bipartisan vote in February (including $60bn for Ukraine, $14bn for Israel and $5bn for Pacific allies including Taiwan) into four separate bills. Each of these would go to an individual vote.
One of the bills would focus on Ukraine (with most of the funding going towards replenishing American munitions), one on Israel, one on Taiwan and Indo-Pacific allies and the fourth on a kind of grab-bag of foreign policy priorities, including banning TikTok in the US, imposing sanctions on Iran and making aid to Ukraine a loan rather than a straight gift.
The details of the four bills have not yet been officially released. But essentially Johnson is proposing to unlink aid for Ukraine – which many Republicans oppose, causing it to languish in the House for months – from aid for Israel, which is more popular with many lawmakers after Iran’s attack on Israel at the weekend.
Controversially, humanitarian aid for Gaza – for which $9bn was allocated in the original Senate bill – may not be included in any of the bills, although it could yet be added (and Democrats insist that bit is non-negotiable). Nor is there any provision for US-Mexico border security, the absence of which Johnson spent months claiming was one of the main reasons he wasn’t bringing the Senate bill to a floor vote in the House.
What are its chances of success?
Each bill would need to pass its own vote, which on the face of it could be difficult. Republicans have only a two-seat majority in the House, and Georgia congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene immediately denounced the bill as a “sham”. Johnson’s plan received some initial support from other hard-right Republicans, but several of them then expressed scepticism about the speaker’s plan to bundle the bills together when they are sent to the Senate.
“Israel funding should not be held hostage by Ukraine funding,” congressman Andy Biggs, a Republican of Arizona, said on X. “The American people deserve to know where their senators stand on each funding component.”
Many Republicans will also want to be allowed to make amendments to the bill. But Democrats may join Republicans in support of procedural movements and some of the bills themselves.
Once the text is released, House rules require at least three days before a bill goes to a vote – and with the House taking another week-long break on Thursday, that means it could take several weeks before any results.
Then, each bill that is passed by the House would need to go back to the Senate for (re)approval, with no guarantee it would survive.
But Johnson seems to feel he had no choice. Many far-right Republican members oppose Ukraine aid, with some members threatening to torpedo Johnson’s leadership should he bring the original Senate bill to a vote in the House. He reportedly told Joe Biden in a phone call that, although a much more complicated plan with myriad potential obstacles facing each bill, splitting the aid bill into four individual ones was the only solution. “If I do the same thing as the Senate bill, I know we can’t process it,” Johnson told Biden, according to Politico. “This is the only way forward.”
What is the current situation on the battlefield in Ukraine?
With western aid stalling and Russia on the offensive across multiple fronts, Ukraine is nearing its most perilous period since it first repelled Moscow’s full-scale assault in February 2022, stunning the world.
For months, Ukraine has grappled with three pressing challenges: insufficient ammunition, a scarcity of experienced troops amid mounting casualties, and dwindling air defence missiles.
The eastern Ukrainian Donetsk region has been the focal point of Russia’s slow advance, with Russian forces currently aiming to capture the strategically important town of Chasiv Yar.
“The situation on the eastern front has significantly worsened in recent days,” the Ukrainian commander-inchief, Oleksandr Syrsky, wrote on Telegram, after a visit to the eastern Donetsk region on Saturday.
Syrsky said Russia was hoping to capture Chasiv Yar by 9 May, when Moscow celebrates its victory over Nazi Germany.
What are the other schemes to arm and fund Ukraine?
In addition to military and financial assistance from European Nato allies – including Germany, France and the UK – and others, the Czech Republic is leading a multinational initiative to buy hundreds of thousands of artillery ammunition rounds for Ukraine.