Apollonian
Guest Columnist
Republicans Turn on Each Other Over Ukraine’s Latest Request
Link: https://americanliberty.news/defens...test-request/phouck/2023/01/?utm_medium=emailByPatrick Houck
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January 21, 2023
Est. Read Time: 5 min.
Defense NewsForeign AffairsNational Security
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy is unequivocal: there’s no substitute for sending tanks to Ukraine.
With the country bracing for a possible, multi-pronged Russian offensive, or at least localized operations, the clock is ticking to build up defenses around strategic positions.
The U.S. Congress agreed to send a Patriot missile battery as part of Kyiv’s latest $2 billion security assistance package. But more isolationist members of the Republican caucus aren’t happy. Chief among them is controversial Georgia Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene.
While mainstream Republicans increasingly back Greene’s push to audit U.S. aid to Ukraine, there’s plenty of pushback to her intransigence on providing the fledging democracy with more firepower to inflict further damage on the Russian Armed Forces and Vladimir Putin’s global standing.
One of her GOP opponents on the issue, Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., has publicly come out in support of sending main battle tanks, like the M1 Abrams, to the pot-marked battlefields of Eastern Europe.
Greene wasn’t having any of it, as Newsweek reports:
“Why aren’t you calling for tanks at America’s southern border while our country is invaded everyday and Americans are being murdered in record numbers by Chinese fentanyl from the Cartels? We serve the American people, who pay for the tanks and our salaries, not Zelenskyy,” Greene tweeted in reference to the Biden administration’s immigration policies and fentanyl that has been seized at the U.S.-Mexico border.
Her remarks come after Graham and Democratic Senators Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut and Sheldon Whitehouse of Rhode Island visited Kyiv on Friday, and criticized the delays from the West in supplying Ukraine with tanks, Reuters reported.
“All three of us, one Republican and two Democrats, share the same goal – for Ukraine to drive the Russians out of Ukraine. To achieve that goal, the Ukrainian military needs tanks,” Graham tweeted Friday.
Berlin has failed to reach an agreement on providing Kyiv with Leopard 2 tanks, considered only second to the M1 Abrams. The ongoing negotiations have continent-wide repercussions, as 13 European countries possess Leopard tanks. Many of them have already agreed to send the German-made tanks to Ukraine, but doing so requires Germany’s permission.During his visit to the war-torn country, Graham blasted Germany in a press conference after meeting with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky who he said asked for “investment, not charity.”
CNN has more on the impressive capabilities of the latest variant of the Leopard 2.
“Leopard 2 is a modern, well-protected main battle tank with good sensors,” Jack Watling, Senior Research Fellow in Land Warfare at the Royal United Services Institute (RUSI), told CNN. “It was originally designed to be maintained by conscripts and is therefore simpler to keep in the fight than some other NATO designs like the Challenger 2. There is also an existing production line to keep Leopard 2s supplied with spare parts.”
Leopards meanwhile run on diesel, unlike Abrams, which makes their fuel consumption more efficient and reduces the number of fuel trucks required to support a battalion.
These are among the reasons why critics of Berlin’s stance say Leopard 2s should be shipped to Ukraine regardless of whether the US decides to send its own M1 Abrams tanks.
READ NEXT: The Alarming Reason Washington’s Elite Are Embracing States’ Rights“Leopards are available in Europe,” CDU lawmaker Roderich Kiesewetter told CNN on Friday. “Abrams have a lot of logistic support needed, it’s much more costly to deliver (them).