"The White House proposal, released Oct. 20, would spend almost $106 billion overall, including $61 billion in military aid for Ukraine, $14 billion in military aid to Israel, $14 billion for U.S. border security, $7 billion in military spending focused on the Pacific region, and $9 billion in humanitarian aid, divided into as-yet undetermined shares for Ukraine, Israel, and Gaza."
(The actual address is about 15 minutes long; I didn't clip it at the end from the subsequent network analysis section.)
Let me state, first of all, I'm somewhat sympathetic to the situation of Ukraine; by any objective standard, Russia has violated the core nonaggression principle, the violation of voluntary association. For all Ukraine government challenges, including persistent corruption and some constraints on political expression and representation, there is certainly a moral case for helping Ukraine defend its citizens' natural rights against the Russian aggressor. Ukraine gave up local nuclear weapons in the Budapest Memorandum in which the US and Russia gave Ukraine security reassurances. We now know Russia has not honored its part of the agreement
US State (federal) aid is more problematic than private, voluntary aid like the Atlas Network. For one thing, government tax revenues are compulsory in nature, we have minimal impact on spending and any borrowed funds must be repaid by future taxpayers. Foreign aid may be partially to the benefit of self-interested crony capitalists such as the military industrial complex, displace local supply chains and/or may discourage local or regional dispute resolution. Foreign interventions have unintended consequences like 9/11 or prolonged occupations and the squandering of blood and treasure. In part, NATO had violated assurances to Russia not to expand in the aftermath of the dissolution of the USSR and the Warsaw Pact. There was no interest in disbanding NATO or inviting Russia to join the alliance, and so Russian anxiety grew as the alliance grew eastward towards its border. Ukraine was particularly sensitive given some past era ethnic Russian migrations and the naval importance of Crimea.
I do question the nature and extent of the aid. For example, certain requested military aid could be used to cross the border in nondefense operations, and it seems that US aid dwarfs that of European natioms (Statistica shows over $75B, between Jan 22 and this past May, compared to just `$35B of EU instituions and $11B from the UK as the lead European country. The Council on Foreign Relations, on the other hand, mentions about $83B from EU institutions in finanial and humanitarian aid Germany with over $20B. Part of the ifference is the CFR figures extend into July.). We can thus argue the US has paid a disproporionte share of the cost for primarily a regional conflict that dosn't diretly involve the national defense. Certainly part of the story was Putin's aggressive stance towards anything he saw as European meddling in the war, including advacced militay aid, sometimes suggesting possible use of nuclear weapons in the war theater (obviously with fallout and other impacts going beyond Ukraine's borders). But still, the proportionate higher aid is morally hazardous: Ukraine had less incentive to reach a settlement with Russia, and other parts of NATO had little incentive to balance the support even though the EU is more populous than the US with a comparable economy. I also remain concerned about ongoing corruption in the Ukraine gvernment and the need for more tolerant democratic reforms.
Biden is trying to use 3 other GOP-favoed prioriies to sell his legislative grabbag: Israel (post Hamas massacre), Taiwan (counterproductive China bashing), and southern border security. (A significant number of Trumpkin Congressmen are balking at Ukraine "blank checks".) I have aome concerns about the size and extemt of the aid package with a floated budget deficit and national debt, I'm concerned about entanglements potentially drawing us into three different global regional conflicts not directly involving our own self-defense (the Mideast, East Europe and Southeastern Asia); I'm not sure why we are subsidizing military expenditures of advanced democracies and economies like Taiwan and Israel, and I don't want Amerian aid being used in Gaza operations yielding high numbers of civilian casualties. Ukraine aid is morally justfiable but I am concerned about some dvanced items like fighter jets being used outside of Ukraine's borders, and I think Congress should attach strings related to government reforms as earlier discussed. I do not support Biden's proposal as currently stated.
