According to the data, 55 percent of Americans do not think Congress “should authorize additional funding to support Ukraine in the war with Russia,” while 45 percent said Congress should approve more.
Another 51 percent say the U.S. has “done enough” to “stop Russian actions in Ukraine,” while 48 said Washington has not done enough.
For comparison, according to CNN, 62 percent of Americans polled just after Ukraine was invaded said the U.S. should be doing more.
Not surprisingly, the responses tracked heavily on partisan lines. On the question of Congressional funding, 71 percent of Republicans, 38 percent of Democrats, and 55 percent of independents said no more funding. On the promotion of more aid, it was flipped, with 62 percent of Democrats, 28 percent of Republicans, and 44 percent of independents saying Congress should authorize more. Whether one identified as a “liberal” or “conservative” dictated support for more or less aid respectively.
How this will play out in the expected vote for more Ukraine aid this fall is anyone's guess, as it will depend on how much and through what kind of package the new funding will be proposed. A handful of Republican lawmakers have already promised a fight, either to stop the aid entirely or to put conditions on it before passing.
This doesn’t mean that Americans aren't still in favor of assisting the Ukrainians, however. Solid majorities in the CNN/SSRS poll want to share intelligence with Ukraine (63 percent) and offer military training (53 percent). Less than 50 percent want to continue giving Kyiv weapons (43 percent). Only 17 percent want U.S. soldiers on the ground participating in combat with the Ukrainians.
The poll also doesn’t bode well for Biden’s handling of major foreign policy issues. Some 53 percent disapprove of how he is handing the war in Ukraine; 56 percent disapprove of how he is handling Russia; and 57 percent disapprove of how he is handling the relationship with China.
U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken performs "Rockin' in the Free World" with members of The 1999 band at the Barman Dictat bar as he visits Kyiv, Ukraine, on May 14, 2024. BRENDAN SMIALOWSKI/Pool via REUTERS TPX IMAGES OF THE DAY
Last night Secretary of State Blinken played Neil Young’s bitterly ironic protest song, “Rockin' in the Free World” in a Kyiv bar. His speech Tuesday laying out the U.S. plan for a “Free, Secure, and Prosperous Future for Ukraine” was full of ironies as well, although he’d prefer that we be oblivious to those too.
After almost two and a half years of war, the speech announced a “stay the course” approach for Washington’s Ukraine policy. Rather than use the recent $60 billion aid package to lay the groundwork for a feasible plan to end the conflict, the speech promised continued U.S. support for unconditional victory and continued efforts to bring Ukraine into NATO, one of the issues that helped to trigger the war in the first place.
One irony is that Ukraine won’t be permitted to join NATO as long as the war continues. The U.S. and other NATO countries — which could bring Ukraine into the alliance today if they wanted to — won’t make a defense commitment that requires them to risk nuclear conflict by putting their own troops on the Ukrainian front lines and fighting Russia directly. President Biden began his State of the Union speech a few months ago by comparing the war in Ukraine to World War II and calling it critical to the future of freedom, but immediately afterward hastened to assure the public that “there are no American soldiers at war in Ukraine. And I am determined to keep it that way.”
Without a massive and risky escalation by outside powers, the best case scenario for Ukraine seems to be a bloody stalemate into the foreseeable future. Ukrainian territorial control has barely budged since their initial advances against the Russian invasion almost two years ago in summer 2022, even as hundreds of thousands of casualties have been incurred by both sides. U.S. officials admit that it won’t be possible for Ukraine to even attempt offensive operations until 2025, and even then, there is no guarantee that a new offensive won’t just repeat the bloody debacle of Ukraine’s 2023 counter-offensive.
Blinken tried to paint the picture of a thriving and prosperous Ukraine even as the war continued. But he had to distort the tragic situation on the ground to do it. He touted a 5% growth in Ukraine’s economy in 2023, but without mentioning that the Ukrainian economy is still 25% smaller than it was before the war, when it was already one of the poorest countries in Europe. And this economic growth is only achieved by massive infusions of foreign aid — the $115 billion committed by the EU and U.S. to Ukraine so far this year is more than two thirds the size of Ukraine’s own GDP.
Blinken’s speech claimed a sustainable Ukrainian prosperity could be achieved by “the growth of Ukraine’s burgeoning defense industry.” But Russia is hardly likely to permit Ukraine to become a defense production superpower while the two countries remain at war. Whatever you think of arms sales as the foundation for national prosperity, Ukraine can hardly build a globally competitive arms production industry under the disadvantage of having to shoot down a constant rain of Russian missiles aimed at its industrial plants.
The reality is that as long as the war continues Ukraine’s future is as a heavily subsidized battleground for a proxy conflict between the U.S. and EU and Russia. The kind of economic opportunities created by that future are grim at best. In a press conference later in the day, Blinken touted his visit to a Ukrainian “company producing world-leading prosthetics.” No doubt the company is world class, since it has to supply the demand from fifty thousand Ukrainian amputees (and counting) created by the ongoing conflict.
The $60 billion in aid offered by the U.S. is expensive in an absolute sense, but Americans barely notice it against the background of a $27 trillion economy. It’s Ukraine that bears the true cost of the war. With elections in Ukraine canceled for the foreseeable future as the conflict continues there are few mechanisms for the Ukrainian public to call for an alternative path.
We now know that there were serious Russian-Ukrainian peace talks taking place two years ago, soon after the Russian invasion, when Putin realized that his attempt at regime change in Ukraine had been thwarted. Those talks failed in part because Western powers refused to support the combination of compromises and practical security guarantees that Ukraine needed to make a peace agreement work. If the U.S. truly wants to support Ukraine’s future, we need to break from our current policies and champion a practical path to peace today.
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US military releases photos of pier to deliver aid to Gaza (Reuters)
UPDATE, 5/17: As of early Friday, the U.S. military said the first shipments of aid have been delivered onto the Gaza beach via the new pier project. The initial delivery included food bars for 11,000 people, therapeutic food for 7,200 malnourished children, and hygiene kits for 30,000 people, according to the U.S. Agency for International Development. The British government said it had sent 8,400 temporary shelters made up of plastic sheeting. Officials did not say how or when it would be delivered by World Food Program and aid partners into the strip.
The fact that the U.S. military pier project off the coast of Gaza was temporarily stalled last week due to high swells and winds is symbolic of the challenges it now faces as it is reportedly opening for business within the next 24 hours.
So what do we know? A trident pier the length of five football fields is being anchored to the Gaza coast. Humanitarian aid will be dropped off there via ships from the floating pier, also built by the U.S. military, two miles off the coast. According to the Pentagon, two Navy warships will be protecting the floating pier and the sea bound transfer of the aid. Some 1,000 U.S. service members are engaged in the project, which is costing an estimated $320 million for the first three months. U.S. personnel are not supposed to be going "on the ground" in Gaza at any time.
The military will be working with the World Food Program to deliver the aid into Gaza once it hits the beach. DOD officials say they hope to surge some 90 trucks of assistance into Gaza at first, ramping up to 150 trucks a day.
It's what we don't know that should have DOD officials and other interested parties — including military families and the American people — quite concerned.
— The DOD is still not clear as to who will be providing security for this massive operation on the beach. When asked at the daily Pentagon briefing Tuesday, this is what Air Force Gen. Pat Ryder, spokesman, had to say:
"So as you know, U.S. Central Command has been working very closely with USAID, Israelis, other partners in the region on putting together a comprehensive security plan for this temporary pier and the aid distribution routes.
And so a lot of work has gone into that, and of course as we've said all along, force protection is going to continue to be of paramount concern. All that to say we do believe that we have the — the pieces and parts in place so that when we do begin operations, we're confident that — that we'll have the security in place that we need."
Two weeks ago, in a exchange with Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-Fla.) in a House hearing, Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin admitted there is a "possibility" that U.S. military on the trident pier could be attacked. In fact, U.N. representatives on the beach came under mortar fire earlier in May.
“Hamas is already reconstituting cells in the north and elsewhere in Gaza. There are intelligence gaps on the ground that could allow for a surprise attack,” Michael DiMino, a former CIA military analyst and counterterrorism officer now serving as public policy manager and fellow at the Defense Priorities, tells RS.
“As the pier prepares to begin operations, maintaining security both around the pier itself and at the point where aid is transferred to civilians ashore remains a top concern,” DiMino added.
— We don't know if aid can safely get into Gaza. The Israelis say they are on board with the project, but their track record includes backed-up trucks at every crossing, and continued attacks on aid workers (including a U.N. representative, who came under tank fire this week). Israel just took over the Rafah crossing and shut down all aid from coming in, and anyone who was scheduled for critical medical attention, from getting out. Even if the Israelis were to let the World Food Program workers through to deliver the assistance they would be traveling into a war zone in which the chances they would come under direct fire or crossfire are pretty great.
— We don't know where the trident pier is. Earlier reports have pegged it somewhere north of the "humanitarian zone" at Al-Mawasi on the beach and south of the Israeli controlled corridor splitting the Gaza strip in two. As experts have said, the trident pier must be aggressively maintained with military engineers. It is not clear how that is going to happen, or whether the Pentagon is hiring contractors do do that work.
— Finally, how long will this pier be in operation? When asked, the DOD won't say.
To ask "why" wouldn't hurt either. Ryder said yesterday, "as, you know, we continue to see challenges in terms of getting aid in via ground, we're going to continue to employ this method to work with the international community to get aid in to the people of Gaza." Wouldn't using U.S. leverage to ensure land routes were opened, rather than spending millions in U.S. taxpayer dollars and putting U.S. service members at risk be a better option?
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Soldiers stand outside the Altiplano high security prison where Mexican drug gang leader Ovidio Guzman, the 32-year-old son of jailed kingpin Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman, is imprisoned in Almoloya de Juarez, State of Mexico, Mexico January 7, 2023. REUTERS/Luis Cortes
The opioid crisis in the United States shows no sign of abating. Mexican drug cartels are making more money than ever before while fueling the deaths of more than a hundred thousand Americans every year. Overdose deaths in the United States quadrupled between 2002 and 2022. Law enforcement appears overwhelmed and helpless.
It is little wonder, then, that extreme measures are being contemplated to ease the suffering. Planning for the most extreme of measures — use of military force to combat the flow of drugs — is apparently moving forward and evolving. It is an idea that has wedged itself into former President Trump’s head, and now he’s reportedly fine-tuning the idea toward possibly sending kill teams into Mexico to take out drug lords..
Invading Mexico, which think tanks close to the former president have recommended, is a spectacularlybadidea for many reasons. Employing special forces to do the job, like Trump is apparently contemplating, may seem like a middle ground, an alternative that carries less risk and lower costs. While not as insane as an invasion, it would still be a dangerous, counterproductive and ultimately pointless endeavor.
The first problem would be tactical. While U.S. Special Forces would have little trouble killing drug kingpins, they may well have a tough time findingthem. Since Trump has telegraphed the operation, cartel leaders — who are, as a rule, ardent self-preservationists — would go underground (or, more accurately, even more underground) immediately upon his election. Gathering intelligence on their whereabouts would prove difficult, since Mexican authorities would be unlikely to help. Security services generally object to having their sovereignty trampled.
Close coordination with those security services would be rather unwise anyway, since many Mexican officials are on the cartel payroll in one form or another. Four years ago, General Salvador Cienfuegos, who was Mexico’s Secretary of National Defense, was arrested in Los Angeles on drug trafficking charges. Under intense diplomatic pressure from a humiliated Mexico City, the United States dropped the charges and released him. In October of last year, he was given an honorary military decoration by Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador, who himself has been the subject of much speculation about drug-related corruption.
Even if it proved possible to track down the kingpins, killing them would have little effect on the drug trade. Those proposing the special forces “solution” to the fentanyl crisis do not appear to grasp the basic economics: Supply will always find its way to high demand, and new narcotics entrepreneurs will always arise. When the Colombian cartels waned in the 1990s, one may recall, other suppliers quickly emerged in Mexico. If the current moles in Mexico are whacked, new ones will soon pop up elsewhere. Killing the middlemen of the drug trade never solves the problem.
The long, sad history of drug interdiction should teach us all a lesson: The drugs always find a way.
Sending teams of special forces southward on shoot-to-kill missions would also threaten to undo the tenuous rules by which Mexican narcotics trade operates today. The cartels, as violent and barbarous as they are to each other — and to incorruptable Mexican leaders — generally avoid targeting U.S. law enforcement. But if the United States treats this crisis like a war, then so too will the cartels, and they have non-trivial lethal capabilities. Their violence would get worse, and it might well begin targeting U.S. drug-enforcement agents.
If we stop following the law, they will stop following the rules.
There are better ways to address the fentanyl epidemic. For instance, the United States could take what might be called the “quaalude approach.” Some of us are old enough to remember that oddly named illegal depressant, which was popular in the 1970s but had essentially disappeared by the late 1980s. The United States did not militarize the issue but led an effort to eliminate, or at least control, the manufacture of the precursor chemicals for quaaludes around the world. Without those chemicals, the drug dealers could not create their poisons.
Fentanyl is also the product of complex chemical engineering, unlike cocaine or opium. Attacking its manufacturers, rather than its salesmen, contains the only possibility to control the epidemic. This would involve negotiation with China, which is the main supplier of fentanyl’s precursor chemicals today. Some progress has been made in this direction under President Biden, but not enough to make a substantial difference.
If revenge is the goal, then perhaps U.S. Special Forces are the best tool. But revenge very rarely makes for a sound basis for policy. Killing kingpins might make us feel good, and it might burnish presidential reputations, but it will not save vulnerable young people. Other options exist, ones that are far less risky, and that offer more hope for success.
Nonetheless, if Trump wins the presidency in November, deadly attacks on the cartels will be a serious possibility. It would be a perfect Trump policy, one that grabs headlines and makes him look tough yet do little good and even backfire. He has ordered assassinations before, after all. If our warriors kill cartel leaders, it will allow us to bask temporarily in the glow of national vengeance. But such actions will have no effect on the drug trade, and Americans will still die by the tens of thousands. Like so many Trump policies, targeting drug kingpins would provide distractions and illusions, all to no purpose.
We call our struggle against drugs a “war,” but it is fundamentally a law-enforcement problem. Changing that by militarizing the issue will just make the violence worse. And it will not change the fundamental fact that drugs, given high demand, will always find a way.