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CIA director: Abandoning Ukraine by the US would be a mistake of 'historic proportions'

2024-01-31 08:03:24Kosova&Bota SHKRUAR NGA REDAKSIA VOX
CIA director: Abandoning Ukraine by the US would be a mistake of 'historic
CIA chief William Burns

Given the impasse in Congress on a proposal to send more economic and military aid to Ukraine, CIA chief William Burns said the United States would make a mistake of "historic proportions" if it abandoned support for Kiev in the almost two-year war against Russia.

The vote in Congress on the proposal for a new aid of 60 billion dollars for Ukraine is related to the draft law to strengthen immigration controls on the US-Mexico border. But the details of the new immigration law have not yet been settled and the overall legislation has already become part of the presidential campaign, further raising doubts over the approval of new aid to Ukraine.

But Burns, in an essay published Tuesday in the journal Foreign Affairs, said: "Continued arms supplies would put Ukraine in a stronger position if an opportunity arises for serious negotiations" to end the war. .

"The aid offers a chance to secure a long-term win for Ukraine and a strategic loss for Russia," the director of the Central Intelligence Agency said.

"Support at a level that amounts to less than 5% of the United States defense budget is a relatively modest investment with significant geopolitical benefits," he said.
He said the decision by Russia and its President Vladimir Putin to attack Ukraine in February 2022 was "Putin's stupidity".

"At least 315,000 Russian soldiers have been killed or wounded, two-thirds of all the tanks Russia had before the war have been destroyed and Putin's decades-long military modernization program has suffered a blow," Mr Burns said.

However, Burns said President Putin is unlikely to back down from attacking neighboring Ukraine.

"It's always a mistake to underestimate his obsession with controlling Ukraine," Burns said. "Without this control, he believes it is impossible for Russia to be a great power or for him to be a great Russian leader."
Burns said the war is "quietly undermining his power in the country" but said "he continues to believe that time is on his side, that he can destroy Ukraine and wear down its Western backers."

He called on Ukraine to strike deeper into Russian-controlled territory.

"Ukraine's challenge is to strike at Putin's arrogance and demonstrate the high cost to Russia ... not only by making progress on the front lines, but also by launching attacks deeper into their (Russian) territory," Burns said.

The latest wave of Russian attacks in Ukraine

Meanwhile, Ukraine said on Tuesday that overnight the Russian military carried out attacks with 35 drones and two missiles in several regions of the country. Ukraine's air force said air defenses destroyed 15 drones in Mykolaiv, Sumy, Cherkasy, Dnipropetrovsk, Kharkiv, Kherson and Kiev. Ukraine's air force said part of Russia's attack targeted fuel and energy sector infrastructure.

Russia said on Monday that its air defenses destroyed 21 Ukrainian drones that were targeting Russian targets. Russian news agencies reported that the military had destroyed Ukrainian drones over the Russian-annexed Crimean Peninsula, as well as in the Russian regions of Belgorod, Bryansk, Kaluga and Tula. US Secretary of State Antony Blinken warned on Monday that Ukraine's defensive war against Russia would be in jeopardy without a new round of aid approved by Congress.

"Without a new round of aid, everything that the Ukrainians have achieved and that we have helped them achieve will be at risk," Secretary Blinken said at a joint press conference with NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg in Washington.
The NATO chief expressed confidence that the United States will continue to support Ukraine, saying it is in Washington's interest to ensure that Russia does not win in Ukraine. Stoltenberg also said that aid to Ukraine is a joint effort with NATO allies and that it is not seen as charity, but as "an investment in our security".

Russia-Belarus alliance

Russian President Putin met with his Belarusian counterpart, Alexander Lukashenko, on Monday to discuss expanding their alliance, which has already allowed Russia to deploy some of its nuclear weapons in neighboring Belarus.

President Putin highlighted the two countries' "strategic partnership" as part of their 25-year unity agreement that includes deepening political, economic and military ties between the two countries.

"It is important that in the midst of unprecedented external pressure, Russia and Belarus have close cooperation in the international arena and provide uninterrupted support to each other as true allies," Putin said at the start of the talks in St. Petersburg, attended by senior officials from both countries.
Belarusian President Lukashenko has relied on Russian subsidies and political support from Moscow to rule the former Soviet country with an iron fist for nearly three decades. Moscow's support helped Mr Lukashenko survive massive protests in the months after 2020 elections, which the opposition and the West say were rigged.

Lukashenko allowed Russia to use Belarusian territory to send troops to Ukraine in February 2022.

Hungary-Ukraine talks

Hungary announced on Monday that it is ready for a compromise that would pave the way for the European Union to approve a $54 billion aid package for Ukraine ahead of an emergency summit on Thursday. Prime Minister Viktor Orban has been a vocal critic of the EU's financial and military support for Kiev and has maintained close ties to the Kremlin since the start of Russian aggression in Ukraine.

If Hungary does not agree to European aid, EU leaders have proposed another plan involving a deal between the 26 member states and Ukraine, which would also deny Budapest access to EU funds.

Hungarian Foreign Minister Peter Szijjarto met with his Ukrainian counterpart, Dmytro Kuleba, in Kiev to discuss aid and the rights of the Hungarian community in the western Ukrainian region of Zakarpattia. Budapest says the Hungarian minority in the region should have the right to be educated in their mother tongue.

Hungary has an "expectation that members of the Hungarian national community will regain the rights they had in 2015," the Hungarian official said, adding, "We still have a long way to go, but the Hungarian side is ready to finish it this job."

Ukrainian Foreign Minister Kuleba said he considered the issue of the Hungarian minority "fundamentally resolved" but that a joint committee would be established to consider how Kiev could address Budapest's further demands regarding Ukraine's Hungarian community. and present those findings to the respective governments in 10 days. This was Hungarian Foreign Minister Szijjarto's first visit to Ukraine since the start of Russia's large-scale attack on Ukraine in February 2022 and the only official bilateral meeting between the two officials in the past two years./VOA


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