WaPo (“U.S. readies another massive military package for Ukraine“):
The Biden administration is preparing to announce a roughly $2.5 billion military aid package for Ukraine that is expected to include dozens of Bradley and Stryker armored vehicles, according to two people familiar with the decision, as the Pentagon intensifies its support ahead of an expected counteroffensive against entrenched Russian forces.
The war has entered a phase, U.S. officials have said, that will require Ukrainian units to attack enemy forces in a concerted way, using tanks, armored vehicles, artillery and aviation in what is known as combined arms warfare. Bradleys and Strykers would significantly bolster their firepower and allow soldiers to move quickly around the battlefield.
The coming transfer could contain nearly 100 Strykers, one of these people said. It would mark the first time the Pentagon has supplied Ukraine with such vehicles. Those familiar with the plan spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss it ahead of a formal announcement.
The Bradley fighting vehicles included in this transfer will be in addition to 50 vehicles announced earlier this month in a separate $3 billion arms package, the people said. The next tranche of aid also will include a substantial restock of ammunition for howitzers and rocket artillery, they said, and more mine-resistant vehicles.
The new vehicles are intended to complement the large-scale, combined arms training that several hundred Ukrainian soldiers are receiving at a U.S. military facility in Germany to help them change the dynamics of the battlefield, U.S. officials have said. As winter has taken hold, the fighting has concentrated in the south and east, degrading into a violent slugfest where both sides are suffering steep losses for modest gains.
“The Russians are really digging in. … They’re digging trenches, they’re putting in these dragon’s teeth, laying mines. They’re really trying to fortify that FLOT, that forward line of troops,” Undersecretary of Defense for Policy Colin Kahl told reporters at the Pentagon on Wednesday. “To enable the Ukrainians to break through given Russian defenses, the emphasis has been shifted to enabling them to combine fire and maneuver in a way that will prove to be more effective.”
It is unlikely, however, that this aid package will include one of Kyiv’s most impassioned requests: M1 Abrams main battle tanks. The administration has rejected those requests, pointing to the logistical and technical burdens of operating the systems and suggesting they could quickly become a hindrance for the Ukrainians.
“The Abrams tank is a very complicated piece of equipment. It’s expensive. It’s hard to train on. It has a jet engine. I think it’s about three gallons to the mile of jet fuel. It is not the easiest system to maintain,” Kahl said. “It may or may not be the right system, but we’ll continue to look at what makes make sense.”
NYT (“U.S. Warms to Helping Ukraine Target Crimea“) adds:
For years, the United States has insisted that Crimea is still part of Ukraine. Yet the Biden administration has held to a hard line since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, refusing to provide Kyiv with the weapons it needs to target the Crimean Peninsula, which Russia has been using as a base for launching devastating strikes.
Now that line is starting to soften.
After months of discussions with Ukrainian officials, the Biden administration is finally starting to concede that Kyiv may need the power to strike the Russian sanctuary, even if such a move increases the risk of escalation, according to several U.S. officials who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss the sensitive debate. Crimea, between the Black Sea and the Sea of Azov, is home to tens of thousands of dug-in Russian troops and numerous Russian military bases.
White House officials insist there is no change in position. Crimea, they say, belongs to Ukraine.
“We have said throughout the war that Crimea is Ukraine, and Ukraine has the right to defend themselves and their sovereign territory in their internationally recognized borders,” said Adrienne Watson, a spokeswoman for the National Security Council.
Privately, military and administration officials had questioned the utility of Ukraine focusing attacks on Crimea, arguing Kyiv’s military had better targets elsewhere on the battlefield.
But the Biden administration has come to believe that if the Ukrainian military can show Russia that its control of Crimea can be threatened, that would strengthen Kyiv’s position in any future negotiations. In addition, fears that the Kremlin would retaliate using a tactical nuclear weapon have dimmed, U.S. officials and experts said — though they cautioned that the risk remained.
The new thinking on Crimea — annexed illegally by Russia in 2014 — shows how far Biden administration officials have come from the start of the war, when they were wary of even acknowledging publicly that the United States was providing Stinger antiaircraft missiles for Ukrainian troops.
But over the course of the conflict, the United States and its NATO allies have been steadily loosening the handcuffs they put on themselves, moving from providing Javelins and Stingers to advanced missile systems, Patriot air defense systems, armored fighting vehicles and even some Western tanks to give Ukraine the capacity to strike against Russia’s onslaught.
Now, the Biden administration is considering what would be one of its boldest moves yet, helping Ukraine to attack the peninsula that President Vladimir V. Putin views as an integral part of his quest to restore past Russian glory.
American officials are discussing with their Ukrainian counterparts the use of American-supplied weapons, from HIMARS rocket systems to Bradley fighting vehicles, to possibly target Mr. Putin’s hard-fought control over a land bridge that functions as a critical supply route connecting Crimea to Russia via the Russian-occupied cities of Melitopol and Mariupol.
However, President Biden is not yet ready to give Ukraine the long-range missile systems that Kyiv would need to attack Russian installations on the peninsula.
While American support has been vital to Ukraine’s success, the administration’s hedging out of fear of escalation has also been a source of great frustration. The reluctance was understandable in the early stage of the war, when Ukraine’s resolve and ability to hold its own was anything but a sure bet. But we’ve long passed the point where Ukraine is both winning the war and yet taking needless casualties because it’s under-equipped.
I must confess to being befuddled by some of the choices. We’ve been supplying HIMARS rocket artillery—among our more advanced systems—for months but are just now acceding to sending infantry fighting vehicles?! I’m agnostic on supplying Abrams and will take the Pentagon’s word that it’s too hard to maintain and sustain—but the platform itself has been in operation since the early 1980s and is fielded by several Middle Eastern armies; you’d think the Ukrainians could figure it out.*
And, frankly, taking back Crimea is the only acceptable outcome at this point. The Russians have committed atrocity after atrocity; they simply must lose the war in humiliating fashion rather than being allowed to slink back to the status quo ante.
*UPDATE: I gather from David Axe and others that the engine is the issue. Unlike the other armored vehicles being supplied—and just about any other tank in the world—the Abrams operates on a multi-fuel system rather than pure diesel, which vastly complicates both maintenance and supply.
