US doing everything possible to assist Ukraine against Russia

ANKARA

The US defense chief said Wednesday that Washington was doing everything humanely possible to provide security aid to Ukraine, and advance weapons systems would be handed over in the coming days.

Following a meeting of the Ukraine Defense Contact Group in Brussels amid a NATO defense ministers' gathering, US Defense Secretary Lloyd J. Austin and Chairman of Joint Chiefs of Staff Mark. A. Milley held a news conference and commented on support provided to the Ukrainian army.

Lloyd said the US was preparing to provide an additional $1 billion security assistance package and it includes guided Multiple Launch Rocket Systems (MLRS) ammunition, 18 more M-777 howitzers, 36,000 rounds of 155-millimeter ammunition, Harpoon defense systems and thousands of secure radios and night-vision devices.

The US defense chief said partners and allies would provide urgently needed ammunition and other systems to Ukraine and he thanked Germany, the UK, Slovakia, Canada, Poland and the Netherlands.

“We also had some important discussions about how to fortify our mid-term and long-term support for Ukraine through training and sustaining,” he said, adding that the international community was “acutely aware of the dangers” that Ukraine faces as Russia renewed its assault on that country.

Milley said the “rules-based international order is at stake that has been in place since the end of WWII to prevent a great power war and to prevent large powers from conquering smaller countries with military force.”

He noted the US and its allies would “collectively support” Ukraine in its fight against the “illegal war waged by Russia.”

“By the end of this month, we will transfer HIMARS systems, ammunition and trained crews for operational use in the defense of Ukraine,” he said. “In a few weeks, the Ukrainians will have trained, long-range, rocket artillery in the fight.”

“To date, we have trained 420 Ukrainians on the M-777 howitzers, 300 Ukrainians on the self-propelled M-09, 129 on the 113 armored personnel carrier, 100 on unmanned aerial systems and 60, most recently, graduating today, on the HIMARS,” he said.

Moreover, the US has provided up to 6,500 Javelins and 20,000 other anti-armor systems as well as 1,500 stingers and 700 switchblade tactical unmanned aerial systems, he said.

Despite saying that the numbers favored Russia and that Moscow had enough soldiers, the joint chiefs of staff chairman further argued that the Russian advance in the region of Donbas has been quite slow and the battle of attrition has inflicted a tremendous number of casualties for Russian forces.

Responding to a question regarding if the number of weapons systems dispatched to Ukraine would be sufficient, Llyod said one should be careful when comparing the HIMARS and M-270 systems to other weapons systems as American systems strike targets with pinpoint accuracy.

“These are precision ammunition and, with a properly trained crew, they will hit what they aim for and it provides some pretty good capability in terms of distance,” he said.

More than 4,432 civilians have been killed in Ukraine since Russia launched its war on Ukraine on Feb. 24.

Over 14 million people have been forced to flee their homes, including more than 7.3 million that have fled to other countries, according to UN figures.