November 20, 2018 (The
Gardian) In an interview with the Guardian, Former ambassador to NATO Kurt
Volker said there was still a substantial gap between the US and Russia over
how a United Nations peacekeeping force could be deployed to end the four-year
war, and predicted that Vladimir Putin would wait for presidential and
parliamentary elections in Ukraine next year before reconsidering his
negotiating position.
However, Volker argued that
time was not on Putin’s side. He insisted pro-western, anti-Russian sentiment
was growing in Ukraine with every passing month. And he made clear that the Trump
administration was “absolutely” prepared to go further in supplying lethal
weaponry to Ukrainian forces than the anti-tank missiles it delivered in April.
Tanks pass during a military
parade marking Ukraine’s Independence Day in Kiev, Ukraine, on 24 August 2018. Photograph:
Gleb Garanich/Reuters.
“They are losing soldiers
every week defending their own country,” said Volker, a former US ambassador to
NATO. “And so in that context it’s natural for Ukraine to build up its
military, engage in self-defense, and it’s natural to seek assistance and is natural
that other countries should help them. And of course they need lethal
assistance because they’re being shot at.”
It’s natural for Ukraine to
build up its military, engage in self-defense, and it’s natural to seek
assistance. He added: “We can have a conversation with Ukraine like we would
with any other country about what do they need. I think that there’s going to
be some discussion about naval capability because as you know their navy was
basically taken by Russia. And so they need to rebuild a navy and they have
very limited air capability as well. I think we’ll have to look at air
defence.”
In May, Congress approved
$250m in military assistance to Ukraine in 2019, including lethal weaponry.
Congress had voted for military support on a similar scale in the past but was
blocked by the Obama administration, fearful of triggering a matching
escalation from Moscow. The Trump administration lifted that restraint in
December 2017 and then approved the shipment of Javelin missiles.
“The Javelins are mainly
symbolic and it’s not clear if they would ever be used,” said Aric Toler, a researcher
at the Atlantic Council. “Support for the Ukrainian navy and air defence would
be a big deal. That would be far more significant.”
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