The Joe Biden administration requested another massive infusion of cash for its war against Russia. The latest short-term spending proposal seeks nearly $14 billion for weapons and economic assistance for Ukraine. Since Russia invaded Ukraine six months ago, the US has sent Kiev tens of billions in weapons and direct economic assistance.
On Friday, the White House asked Congress to approve $13.7 billion in funds to confront Russia in Ukraine as part of a short-term spending package. The Biden administration’s total request is $47.1 billion for a wide array of issues, including Covid, Monkeypox, disaster relief, and the war in Ukraine.
The White House largely supported Kiev’s war effort by transferring arms owned by the Department of Defense to Ukraine’s military. Within the $14 billion for Ukraine, over half will go to buy weapons. $4.5 billion will go towards the Department of Defense replenishing American stockpiles.
The Presidential Drawdown Authority (PDA) allows the president to make the transfers without Congressional oversight. However, Congress authorized additional funds for the PDA in the $40 billion Ukraine aid bill passed earlier this year. Now, sources in the Pentagon are reporting that Biden’s prolific use of the PDA to arm Ukraine has started to deplete American stockpiles.
The latest spending proposal asks for an additional $2.7 billion in military and intelligence support for Ukraine and $4.5 billion in direct economic support for the government in Kiev. Since Russian President Vladimir Putin ordered the invasion, Congress has authorized $53 billion in funding for the war in Ukraine. If passed, the latest aid package will bring the total to about $67 billion.
In addition to the $11.7 billion to support Ukraine’s war effort, the proposal includes $2 billion to fund the White House’s economic war against Russia. $1.5 billion will be spent on uranium to be used as nuclear fuel. $500 million will go towards upgrading the Strategic Petroleum Reserve. Washington says it is in the middle of an energy war with Moscow. In Europe, gas prices are ten times the average, while the Ruble has strengthened against the dollar.
Kyle Anzalone is the opinion editor of Antiwar.com, news editor of the Libertarian Institute, and co-host of Conflicts of Interest.
Biden is like a teenager who just received a credit card from his parents. How far will he go before they take it away?
That’s the problem. No one can take it away – short of another American Revolution. The Congress gets elected by how much largess they distribute to the US MIC and the US electorate is too stupid to stop it.
I’m in, Richard.
That certainly seems to be true now. But when the recession starts taking a bite, it could be a different story.
And Weimar style inflation.
“They” are just as much in awe with their powers.
You see, it worked. Forever. Just issue more money. Magically, world will need more dollars, problem solved. If we continue with the magic of computer generated money, it is just a question of who will implode first. The world or US. We give highest interest rates — money may come. But wait, the only money coming is the one from accross the pond. Thus, crashing euro and pound. Our friend, Japan, a big loser to.
Except that unlike Europe, Japan remembered reality of it being an Asian state. And kept its investments in Russia’s Sakhalin gas field. So did Korea, keeping investment in Russia’s nuclear power plant construction in Egypt. India is not giving up its ties to Russia. Chinese and Rusian economies are invreasingly intertwined as they are complimentary.
What now! Spend, spend, spend. And see who gets drowned by the dollar avalanche.
We spent $100 billion a year for 20 years on Afghanistan for no reason at all, this is a bargain in comparison
But we are just getting started in Ukraine. Another 20 years from now the bill will be well over $100 Billion.
That would surprise me, unlike Afghanistan we have a partner that is willing to fight. They have already killed enough Russians to get the Russians to retreat, but Russia hasn’t realized it yet. This one will be over by Christmas.
Oh you poor dear.
Hard to tell really. That partner was willing to talk peace but the US/UK would have none of that. Take away the billions and we’d have to see how willing they actually would be.
It probably will be but not the way u think
You think Ukraine will remain as long as that ??
How anti-war of you. Just as long as it’s a bargain, I guess.
I am pointing out a reality, about how much this country is willing to spend. I am decidedly anti-war but what are you going to do when you are actually invaded?
We weren’t actually invaded.
Don’t make enemies in the first place, and we have no threat of being invaded by anyone, except by the illegals at our southern border.
Devil’s advocate: Yes but, assuming your number is correct, it took us 20 years to do that. We spent more than $60 billion on Ukraine in the first 6 months!
No it was $100 billion a year for 20 years 2 trillion in total. The Russian defense budget is $60 billion a year. That includes rocket forces and the Navy guarding very long borders and operations in Syria. Now I will admit that Russia probably spends its defense dollars in a more cost effective way than we do but still Ukraine is getting in material aid what the Russians have to spend on everything. It hardly seems fair. They should leave
Byedone is a terrorist , “representing” a terrorist entity. Palestinian children slaughtered. Hopefully we will have many more 9/11’s
“hopefully we will have many more 9/11’s”
what, giant insurance scam hoaxes?
Another “inflation reduction” program.
Every day now we can’t be THAT naive to continue to believe all the “reasons” for this war. But as usual the bottom line is the money that these CIA-generated wars usher into the controlling elite. Any school kid could have studied the prewar strengths of Russia and the Ukraine and come to the conclusion that Russia would CRUSH the Ukraine! So this war is a sacrifice of the Ukraine by Western USA-controlled interests, using the Ukraine’s fighting resources as virtual cannon fodder against Goliath! The narrative may be whatever, but the end result is always a war industry pay day!
And a very reluctant Goliath at that. The principals are Washington and Russia, the former the aggressor. The essence of soldiering is to be disposable, no matter the nationality. And you’re right, it is a supremely criminal war generating a vastness of blood wealth. While the capacity for credulity is a subsidiary function of this sated belly. Suburbia is proof against critical analysis.
The crash test dummy wins again.
Nuclear Terrorism: Boris Johnson must be arrested and tried in the Hague for his crimes against humanity.
and fashion
He is British. Cut him some slack.
Joey Biden wants another 14 $Billion for the Ukraine war. How about NO!
Between senile angry Joey Biden, obama the puppet master, RINO Republican and hawkish Democrats they are all like pigs eating money swill out of a trough.
Enough wasted money that our children, grand children, great grand children and many generations after will have to pay for.
Let me clue you.in.This country and the world as we know it are doomed.We have no.more time left to fix the trouble we are in.There are not going to be future generations of humans.If we are not exterminated bt politics creating a Nuclear.winter the Climate Change going on now,not.being addressed will do the job
No, it will be the voluntary lack of energy that will push people over the edge to anarchy and civil war and ruination!
Hi Wendell
It has occurred to me that world governments don’t give a rat’s ass about climate change because they figure their mistakes are going to get us all nuked in the end anyways, starting with IsraHell’s likely war on Iran. Nothing but worldwide escalation from that point.
We’re all f*cked one way or the other.
So, where are the anti-war protests, millions in the streets?
They are probably contemplating the meaning of life…
System, USA, will crash before it is EVER paid!
How much is 14 Billion in miles?
The voyager 1 probe was launched from earth in 1977 and is just now a little over 14 Billion miles from earth. The number 14 Billion is a very large number!
I am so sorry I voted for the man. What a disgrace. Nina Turner was right.
Frankly, it is not like we have too many choices…
Donna, my next choice will not have an R or a D behind its name. Like VLP, I voted for the fool “because he wasn’t Trump”. I could throw myself off a cliff.
Nuh u did right. Once Trump had no need to be reelected he probably would’ve launched a war on Iran by the advice of his evangelical nutjob advisers backed up by goodies from his zionist backers
I’m waiting for the Bye-Done regime to allot the one billion dollars it would take the make the water of Jackson, Mississippi useable. The residents have been told to shower with their mouths closed.
Most of us would consider this a disgrace beyond measure; Mississippi is not a third-world country.
But the regime doesn’t have time or money for a Black-majority city when it’s busy playing footsie with a Nazi in a too-tight t-shirt who’s deluded enough to believe he can triumph over Russia and turn his country into “ a big Israel “.
Wipe off your piano keys, ZelBoy; they’re a bit sticky.
Pretty.damn close.
We, and other countries are taking in Ukraine refugees by the thousands, because “they are so much like us”. Meanwhile, Afghan refugees live in tents, in prison=like circumstances. Jackson is just one city in thousands that need infrastructure repair.
Very good post.
Thank you so much.
So true!! 🙂 JoBye, letting the poor people in Miss. rot!
The Feds have funds it is the state level that doesn’t give a rats ass about Jacksons inhabitants.
That is the weakest argument I have ever seen! $Billions for Ukraine, nothing for poor Black Brothers and Sisters and poor Whites in Miss.,,OUTRAGE!!!
“FEMA announced Wednesday that federal emergency aid had been made available to supplement state response efforts to the water crisis in Jackson, Mississippi, after President Biden approved an emergency declaration for the state’s capital.”
And from Fox “News” no less.
https://www.foxnews.com/us/jackson-mississippi-water-crisis-biden-approves-emergency-fema-aid
wars, “made available”, “supplement”,,terms never used in regard to the $billions for Ulraine. JoBye has been shamed into doing something, but I fear he will come up short, he surely waited long enough!!
Hi Jay
My brother has an old Air Force friend whose son is running for US congress in Mississippi. Hopefully he can make a difference should he win.
There is never money for fixing our aging infrastructure. But there is always money for the MIC. This “aid to Ukraine” is mostly aid to the US “defense” corporations that make the weapons and ammo, and most of the rest goes to various other US MIC actors (“trainors,” “consultants,” and the like), and some of it eventually finds it way back to Congressional campaign funds.
Money that is spent in this way only very incidentally, at best, helps anyone remotely like the average American. Instead, it almost all goes to the big money boys. Which creates more inflation, without even the countervailing benefit of putting money in the hands of folks who actually need it. Money spent for arms that are used up in the Ukraine doesn’t create more housing, it doesn’t grow more food, it doesn’t heat more homes, it doesn’t improve education, or communication or transportation networks, nor does it rebuild broken infrastructure (like the water supply in Jackson or Flint). It might as well be burnt in a fire, except that that would actually be better, because it would at least not be inflationary!
Preach it!! HuRaHH! 🙂
“It might as well be burnt in a fire, except that that would actually be better, because it would at least not be inflationary!”
Or used to kill people.
and provide some heat
Beautiful post PL.
I was born and raised in Flint incidentally. I’ve been a country girl for many years now but still retain the Flint attitude 😉
Mississippi is 3rd world by any reasonable measure. The Feds gave $70 million to fund TANF ( temporary aid to needy families) and of those funds several million went to Brent Favre ( a rich NFL QB) to give motivational speeches ( which he didn’t) several more million went to build a volleyball court, some millions went to a horse farm…. Best as they can tell very little went to any needy family temporarily or otherwise. The place is corrupt, beyond the normal level and the people will suffer.
How do u even give money from a program like this to someone(anyone) to give motivational speech? I mean how would u even explain this? Did this guy give kickbacks to the guys authorizing this? Free tickets? I can understand the horse farm thing that’s just basic corruption but speech thing is just comical level of idiocy
it is Mississippi
lol
The flag is in distress.
As it should be.
The country is in distress
And here’s the result: the “great Kherson counteroffensive” has become a debacle, with thousands of Ukrainian dead and wounded – some figures as high as 6,000 over three days – plus at least 130 Ukrainian tanks destroyed.
Moon of Alabama has a recap:
The Ukrainian ‘Counteroffensive’ Was Destined To Fail – Today It Did So
https://www.moonofalabama.org/2022/09/the-ukrainian-counteroffensive-was-destined-to-fail-today-it-did-so.html#comments
Good report on the military situation at that link.
Also, there is this:
In ‘western’ media, complicit with the Zelenski regime, neither the bloody defeat of the ‘counteroffensive’ in Kherson nor the attempted raid on the ZNPP ever happened.
And, oddly enough, here at antiwar.com, there has also been nothing about the falied attempt on the power plant, and only one short-lived, cursory link to “Russian claims” that the “counteroffensive” failed. The fact that it was a bloody, costly failure, and resulted in staggering loss of equipment and wastage of the Kiev regimes’s best troops, and most likely was, at the least, planned by MI6, gets no mention at all. Funny how, in contrast, every so-called Ukrainian “victory,” no matter how trivial, no matter how irrelevant not only strategically, not only tactically, but even operationally (potholes on a bridge, a couple of airplanes damaged, a few officials injurred in a terrorist attack), is given the full, breathless, pom pom waiving, front page, lead article, treatment here, just as it is in the MSM. As is every preposterous claim of “Russian atrocities” coming from the Kiev regime.
A former SEAL that I follow posted about that “Raid”.
I have a lot questions of course. What did they think 60 guys in
boats could do against a well defended target? You gotta wonder. Was the objective to kill the UN Inspection Team?
The first question to ask was “did that even happen?”
I hadn’t been interested enough to search for information on it, but on a quick Bing search, every story seems to rely on Russian state media as the source. Which is just as untrustworthy as relying on western media.
No, it’s not. Not even close. Everything in Western media, as Scott Ritter and others have pointed out, have all the signs of a “CIA information operation.” A huge percentage of it comes directly from Ukraine filtered through the Institute for the Study of War which is a neocon front organization run by the Kagan family. They’ve even been quoted here.
Right! And remember—General Jack Keane, the talking head General on FOX, works for the Kagans’ Institute for the Promotion of War.
Relying on Google Bing ect? You should just watch PMSNBC. Or DNCNN. You will get essentially the same narrative. Russian State is no different. From their point of view.
you understand that Bing is just a search engine, right? It doesn’t tell me anything, it just tells me what other people are saying. I also use several other search engines, including Yandex, A Russian search engine, which also cites no sources other than Russian state media — which is about as reliable as MSNBC or CNN if you’re looking for facts — for the supposed Ukrainian special op.
Such a cop out. Story after story is run here with nothing but “Ukrainian officials say….” as the source. And even that understates things, as the Ukrainian side has been shown time and time again to be far more “untrustworthy” than the Russian side. Also, this blog is a Western blog. And so should strive to correct Western propaganda and quisling media deficiencies, as those are far more relevant to the readers as citizens than are propaganda efforts of Russia. Cop out, fundamentally unconvincing on the facts, and false equivalence.
And, really, you are not even “interested” in the either the total failure of the much ballyhooed Ukrainian counteroffensive, or a thwarted multi pronged Ukrainian commando attack on a nuclear power plant, complete with UN inspectors on the scene!
Have the USA, NATO or the Kiev Regime claimed that the Russians made up the attempted raids on the power plant? Have the MSM done so? Isn’t the Russian “claim,” which stands unrebutted, at least worthy of mention?
“Story after story is run here with nothing but ‘Ukrainian officials say….’ as the source.”
And I assign the same credibility to those stories as I do to stories with nothing but “the Russian Ministry of Defense says” as a basis.
That’s just not responsive.
Google result:
Your search – “Tom Knapp’s duties of responsiveness to philadelphialawyer” – did not match any documents.
So you give as much credence to Ukrainian sources? Never checked out or provided with evidence?
I give exactly as much credence to Ukrainian regime sources as I do to Russian or US regime sources. That level of credence is “consider untrue until and unless proven.”
“consider untrue until and unless proven.”
I agree. It needs to be very clear each time, to avoid being taken the wrong way by those so inclined.
When can we believe something? I try to follow all the lies of all the sides, on the theory that if they overlap, agreeing on something, then that part might possibly be part of the truth. Maybe.
However, I am guided by a college project I did, reading the weekly newsmagazines in the Grad Library, and comparing their reports to what history now tells us actually happened in those weeks of WW2. Even the overlap was not a sure guide. It was wild invention. That is what I expect this time too.
We might find a better guide in accidental “admissions against interest” (a lawyer’s term) that do happen, such as Blinken confessing he made not the slightest effort to avoid the war when he had the chance in the two months before it.
But your site keeps posting them….
You must have me confused with someone else. I don’t own Antiwar.com. I don’t write Antiwar.com’s news stories, nor do I set its editorial line.
“Story after story is run here with nothing but ‘Ukrainian officials say….’ as the source.”
And I assign the same credibility to those stories as I do to stories with nothing but “the Russian Ministry of Defense says” as a basis.
Justin would be turning in his have had he know hou low has Antiwar sunk. It seems that Antiwar was coopted in the MSM or they are scared ,shitless, to post anything but whatever Reuters tell them.
One has to assume the objective was related to the Inspection Team being there. I doubt they intended to kill the UN team, unless they could pawn it off on the Russians. Maybe more to take the plant while the inspectors were there, and then use their presence as an excuse for some kind of “neutral peacekeepers” to take it over? A foot in the door, and a figleaf, for NATO intervention? Or even just to stall the Russians? A “Hail Mary” pass, without a clear objective? Just do anything to “change the game,” no matter how risky, and no matter that it threatened environmental and humanitarian catastrophe?
It certainly seems worth talking about, and yet antiwar.com has not, to my knowledge, even mentioned it. And has barely reported on the failed, made-for-media and social media, Kiev Neo Nazi regime “counteroffensive” at all.
Well stated.
Indeed, I’ve been wondering about that, too.
“It would bring the total funds authorized for the war in Ukraine to $67 billion if approved.”
Top 10 Countries with the Highest Military Expenditures (2020):
The United States — $778 billion
China — $252 billion [estimated]
India — $72.9 billion
Russia — $61.7 billion
United Kingdom — $59.2 billion
Saudi Arabia — $57.5 billion [estimated]
Germany — $52.8 billion
France — $52.7 billion
Japan — $49.1 billion
South Korea — $45.7 billion
If you notice, our handout to Ukraine has just past Russia’s entire defense budget for 2022. I won’t even wait to see if will be approved since that is a forgone conclusion.
This could be part of Putin’s plan to bleed the us and nato dry of military resources and economic/financial resources; if so, all is going according to plan.
Europe is a basket case and getting worse; the us is rapidly depleting its military resources but the MIC is ecstatic, moar war they cry.
To state the obvious, I’m not sure where the money is coming from in the us, pentagon slush funds?, which I’m sure are in abundance.
Meanwhile, must keep the gravy train going as it is exceedingly obvious that these funds are being siphoned off directly and indirectly by us grifters and ukie grifters.
Saw a report that one of z’s handlers is taking salary directly ~$28k/month. That is prob a fraction of what z is taking to his off shore ac’s as all of this cronies and handler are doing the same.
Another excellent article by Jacques Baud, whose CV is here:
https://be.linkedin.com/in/jacques-baud-20227614b
Our Latest Interview with Jacques Baud
https://www.thepostil.com/our-latest-interview-with-jacques-baud/
The sweetest dish is when Ukraine collapses while bankrupting U.S. at the same time.
Other takes on the failed “Kherson offensive”…
Andrei Martyanov:
Keeping What Matters In Focus.
https://smoothiex12.blogspot.com/
Larry Johnson:
Ukraine Does Damage Control As counter Attack Falters
https://sonar21.com/ukraine-does-damage-control-as-counter-attack-falters/
And The Duran guys:
Botched Kherson counteroffensive. Zaporozhye NPP Hollywood raid. Part 1
Latest from Russian MoD via MoA:
wow Biden $14 Billion ? i wonder how much Bush would have demanded
https://www.indianpunchline.com/moment-of-truth-in-the-ukraine-war/
“Moment of Truth in The Ukraine War.”
It seems that a global credit squeeze that may largely exempt Russia doesn’t augur well for NATO’s near-term Ukraine objectives.
If anything, one might anticipate exponentially higher VSU body counts.
In total, since the beginning of the special military operation Ukraine has lost, 286 aircraft, 151 helicopters, 1867 unmanned aerial vehicles, 372 anti-aircraft missile systems, 4776 tanks and other armored combat vehicles, 824 combat vehicles of multiple launch rocket systems, 3366 field artillery guns and mortars, and also 5250 units of special military vehicles.
Interestingly today. in Kherson Ukraine. NATO sent Polish Leopard2 tanks into the bridgehead that Russia had set up as a fire trap. The bridgehead is littered with burnt NATO tanks. This is the first time that NATO tanks have been seen in Ukraine, are all the European stocks of Russian tanks exhausted?
Which begs the question, who crewed the Polish tanks, NATO?
Biden doesn’t have a clue; much less “asking” Congress for more money.