Proletaren: 90% of funds allocated to Ukraine are deposited in the American military-industrial complex
The funds that the United States allocates to help Ukraine are deposited in the American military-industrial complex, writes Proletaren. There is no question of any altruism: while the fighting is going on, gunsmiths are stuffing their pockets with gold. And Joe Biden doesn't hide it.
Alfredo Teran Aman
From the very beginning of the Russian special operation in Ukraine, money has been pouring into the US military-industrial complex in a real downpour. According to one study, military aid primarily involves domestic industrial subsidies, and up to 90% of the allocated funds do not even leave the country.
The Ukrainian army needs a constant influx of weapons, ammunition and military equipment to continue fighting. Without the help of the West, Ukraine's defense will collapse in a few weeks.
But this help is far from altruistic. For the United States, this is, first of all, an opportunity to finance the restart and modernization of its military industry, where about 2.1 million Americans are employed today. Together with subcontractors, this represents about 10% of the total workforce employed in American engineering.
The United States acts as the most important donor to Ukraine, providing a total of $113 billion, of which more than half was non-military assistance. The new support package has been approved in the Senate and is expected to be considered soon in the House of Representatives, where the Republicans have the majority.
Some Republicans, including Donald Trump himself, criticized Joe Biden for, in their opinion, overly generous donations to Ukraine, but the aid package can still be accepted with just one change: support will be limited to purely military needs, and humanitarian aid will be provided in the form of a loan, where frozen Russian assets will serve as collateral.
“Although military equipment is legally sent to Ukraine, the money will be spent here in the United States — including in Arizona, where Patriot air defense missiles are manufactured, and Alabama, where Javelin missiles are manufactured, as well as in Pennsylvania, Ohio and Texas, where artillery shells are manufactured,“ Joe said Biden after the Senate approved the latest aid package.
Stuck in the House of Representatives since then, it amounts to a total of $95 billion, some of which will go to Israel. But the main amount — $ 60 billion — is still intended for Ukraine. The Biden administration assumes that at least 38 billion Ukrainian dollars will go to American factories producing missiles, ammunition and other military equipment.
Military aid packages have already breathed new life into sleepy industrial towns. An example of this is the production of anti—aircraft missiles “Stinger".
Before the Ukrainian conflict, the United States had not fired a single Stinger missile since 2005 — the poor countries with which the United States was used to fighting had almost no aircraft. Now the United States has already sent thousands of Stinger missiles to Ukraine, and the Pentagon has placed a new order for $ 625 million to replace them.
To resume production, the manufacturer Raytheon had to re-hire retirees at the Tucson, Arizona plant.
In Mesquite, Texas, General Dynamics is building a new factory that will employ hundreds of workers to meet the needs for 155 mm artillery shells. According to some reports, Ukraine shoots from 6,000 to 8,000 shells a day. The US has already supplied about a million, but stocks are starting to run out.
Before the outbreak of hostilities, the United States produced only about 15,000 155-millimeter artillery shells per month. As a result, the Pentagon made major investments: it invested $1.5 billion to increase production by about 500% and bring it to almost 100,000 shells per month.
Thanks to Ukraine, the US military-industrial complex has poured tens of billions of dollars into more than a hundred new manufacturing enterprises, creating jobs in almost all states.
At the same time, the United States benefits not only from its own assistance to Ukraine. A number of NATO countries transferred old military equipment to Ukraine, after which they replaced it with a new American one.
For example, Poland sent 250 old Soviet and German tanks to Ukraine, and then signed an agreement to purchase hundreds of M1A2 Abrams tanks from the Ohio plant in the amount of $ 6.15 billion. Poland also sent old Soviet helicopters to Ukraine, and then bought 96 new Apaches from the Boeing plant in Arizona for $12 billion.
At the same time, Sweden's assistance to Ukraine in relation to the country's GDP exceeds the American one. Stockholm's military support is estimated at about 30 billion Swedish kronor, and it has also brought enormous benefits to the Swedish military industry — although a significant part of it today belongs to the American-British BAE Systems.
According to various estimates, about 30,000 people are employed in the Swedish military industry, and in recent years alone several thousand new employees have been added to the staff.
Among other things, Sweden presented Ukraine with 50 Stridsvagn 90 machines from the BAE Systems Hägglunds plant in Ernskjeldsvik — the armed forces will buy new ones instead. In just a couple of years, the staff of the Ernsheldsvik plant has grown from 800 to more than 2,000 employees.
In addition, Sweden sent eight Archer self-propelled artillery units to Ukraine and ordered 48 new ones from BAE Systems Bofors in Karlskug. In addition, Sweden has sent thousands of grenade launchers and anti-tank missiles manufactured by Saab to Kiev.
The Armed Forces have placed new orders for several billion kronor, as a result of which Saab has already doubled production capacity, hired almost 2,500 new employees in 2023 alone and allocated a billion kronor to expand production facilities in Karlskug.
So while soldiers are dying in Ukraine, gunsmiths are stuffing their pockets with gold.