With the war in Ukraine well into its second year, much attention has been given to the sustainability of US aid to Ukraine. While US President Joe Biden has committed the US to providing support for Ukraine for the foreseeable future, Russian President Vladimir Putin’s strategy appears to be waiting out US money and material.
However, which one is more realistic? To see which will win out in the end, we must look at the fundamentals of US aid and how they will affect both the support’s longevity and its effectiveness.
The budget for the Ukraine war is substantial, but not when compared to the US military budget, the total federal budget, or even past US spending on wars. As of May, 2023, the US spent a total of $75 billion on humanitarian, economic, and military aid to Ukraine.
61% of this aid is military aid, representing $46.6 billion. In comparison, the combined US planned military expenditures over the last two fiscal years have been over $1.6 trillion, meaning Ukraine military aid represents less than 3% of the US defense budget.
Out of the $9.87 trillion in total US government spending, total aid to Ukraine represents less than 1% of it. The cost also pales in comparison to the estimated $8 trillion the US spent on the Afghanistan and Iraq wars. In short, so long as Biden is willing to write more checks, the US can keep money flowing to Ukraine indefinitely.
However, while money can be handed out indefinitely, material cannot. Most of the physical US military aid e.g. weapons, vehicles, equipment, come from pre-existing stocks. For instance, the 109 Bradley fighting vehicles pledged to Ukraine come out of a 4,000 stockpile. Similarly, the 31 Abrams tanks pledged to Ukraine in January come from a 6,209 stockpile.
Many of these stocks cannot be quickly or easily replaced, either because they are specialized systems that take a long time to build, or because US defense contractors do not have the capacity to keep up with demand. For example, the US has provided over a million artillery shells to Ukraine despite only having the production capacity to produce 2,350 per month. Furthermore, because these stocks must be at a certain level to meet US national security requirements, much of this production cannot be routed to Ukraine.
In other words, US military aid to Ukraine is sustainable to a point. Putin’s strategy of waiting out US aid might not apply to the financial aspect, but may potentially be valid in terms of depleting the US’s arms stockpiles. However, a decline in material aid does not necessarily mean a decline in overall support. US aid may shift to providing more non-material support such as combat training, intelligence, or cyber support. Furthermore, material aid from the EU and other Western allies like Japan may offset any decline in US material support. In short, while the question of “when will it end” may loom large, a more insightful question might be, “how will it change?”
