Washington rushes to send more weapons as Kiev’s battlefield situation deteriorates
The US Department of Defense announced another $275 million worth of armaments destined for Ukraine on Friday, amid Kiev losing ground in both the Kharkov Region and the Donbass as Moscow pushes to cut a buffer zone to protect its border regions.
This is the fifth top up package since US President Joe Biden signed a massive foreign spending bill that earmarked over $60 billion in various types of military aid to Kiev, the DOD said in its Friday press release. This tranche of US armaments will be part of Washington’s “efforts to help Ukraine repel Russia’s assault near Kharkov, has an estimated value of $275 million,” and serve Kiev’s “most urgent battlefield needs, such as additional precision strike rockets for High Mobility Artillery Rocket Systems (HIMARS), artillery rounds, air-launched munitions, and anti-tank weapons,” the statement said.
On top of HIMARS rockets, it includes artillery ammunition, mines and other munitions. In addition, tactical vehicles, armor and chemical, biological, radiological, nuclear protective equipment were included.
The US arms package comes as Kiev is pressured on multiple fronts with Russian troops advancing in both the Ukrainian Kharkov Region and Russia’s Donetsk People’s Republic. In early May, Moscow’s forces launched a push into the Ukrainian north-east towards Kharkov, capturing more than a dozen settlements along the way.
The goal of the operation is to create a buffer zone between Kiev-controlled territory and the Belgorod Region of Russia, in an effort to curb Ukrainian attacks on the local civilian population, President Vladimir Putin has said.
This week, Moscow has liberated Andreevka and Klescheevka of the Donetsk People’s Republic, pushing in on the Ukraine-held city of Chasov Yar, the Russian Ministry of Defense reported.
The latest US arms package comes amid a push among Kiev’s war sponsors to lift alleged restrictions on using Western-supplied armaments to strike “internationally recognized” Russian territories.
However, according to Moscow such rhetoric is designed to maintain the illusion that the West is not part of the conflict, while in fact Kiev is using Western arms against “civilian infrastructure and residential districts” well outside the conflict zone on a daily basis, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said.
