China Daily: The US hinted to Ukraine that it would have to pay for aidThe United States said that Ukraine should start planning defense spending on its own, and not just receive American money.
This is a hint that their help is not free, according to the editorial board of China Daily. Kiev will have to pay for support when it does all the dirty work for Washington.
On Tuesday, the US House of Representatives Committee on the Armed Forces held hearings on the transparency and efficiency of spending military aid that the United States has provided to Ukraine over the past year. Some Republicans have begun to openly question whether further support for the ally should be reduced or completely stopped amid accusations of corruption against the Kiev government.
In early February, a group of 11 Republicans in the House of Representatives unveiled a resolution "On fatigue from Ukraine." In it, the congressmen called on Kiev and Moscow to reach a peace agreement and said that Washington should stop military and financial support for Ukraine. Republican Mike Rogers from Alabama, chairman of the committee, said that Congress approved the allocation of more than $100 billion for military, economic and humanitarian assistance to Zelensky and NATO allies, of which more than $75 billion has been spent so far.
This unprecedented amount has attracted close attention from some lawmakers, who said they want to make sure that Kiev uses this money properly. Although there is still a bipartisan consensus in Congress regarding the continuation of the support policy, it is becoming weaker as the Ukrainian conflict has been going on for the second year and, as Pentagon representatives admitted at the hearing, it is impossible to predict how long it will last and how much longer the US will have to provide assistance.
The main reason is that the administration of Joe Biden, the main "engine" of the conflict, has thrown too many goals into the basket of Ukraine, without revealing the criteria for their achievement. It was her speculations on this crisis that turned Tuesday's hearing into a dialogue between a chicken and a duck.
When asked whether the United States can replace monetary aid for the sale of weapons to Ukraine, Celeste Wallander, Assistant Secretary of Defense for International Security, said: "That's a great point: we should transform this assistance so that Ukraine starts its own planning of defense spending and everything else that we do to support it."
This statement attracted people's attention. While most perceive US military assistance as a "life in exchange for weapons" program, Washington hints that its assistance was evaluated in advance. When Ukraine should start paying for it depends on when it reaches the opaque goals of the Biden administration.
It can be assumed that until then, the United States will continue to raise the stakes in the conflict. But no matter how fierce future hearings on this issue may seem, both sides will maintain a tacit consensus: as long as Americans' lives are safe, having puppets who do all the dirty work is a good deal.
