Back in December, the Pentagon announced that they had burned through all of the money designated to supply military aid to Ukraine, so future shipments would have to wait until Congress appropriated more funds. That hasn't happened because the House GOP is insisting that Joe Biden fix our borders before we blow even more cash on those of another country. Now, it would appear that Biden's patience is exhausted because the Pentagon is shipping another $300 million worth of weapons to Ukraine anyway. How are they doing that? They claim to have mysteriously "found some cost savings" in their contracts. But in reality, they've already spent $10 billion more than they were supposed to on Ukraine. So much for oversight, I suppose. (Associated Press)

The Pentagon will rush about $300 million in weapons to Ukraine after finding some cost savings in its contracts, even though the military remains deeply overdrawn and needs at least $10 billion to replenish all the weapons it has pulled from its stocks to help Kyiv in its desperate fight against Russia, the White House announced Tuesday.

It’s the Pentagon’s first announced security package for Ukraine since December, when it acknowledged it was out of replenishment funds. It wasn’t until recent days that officials publicly acknowledged they weren’t just out of money to buy replacement weapons, they are $10 billion overdrawn.

The announcement comes as Ukraine is running dangerously low on munitions and efforts to get fresh funds for weapons have stalled in the House because of Republican opposition. U.S. officials have insisted for months that the United States wouldn’t be able to resume weapons deliveries until Congress provided the additional replenishment funds, which are part of the stalled supplemental spending bill.

This is, as their Commander-in-Chief is wont to say, a load of malarkey. $300 million doesn't just magically appear out of thin air. Of course, we've seen the Pentagon playing these games before, such as when they started "revising" their estimates of what the weapons we've been shipping to Ukraine are actually worth or when they "found" more armaments while supposedly going through their inventory. Of course, this is the same Pentagon that has failed to complete every single audit they have attempted as required by law, so it appears that nobody really knows what they have or how much money they spend.

Don't think for a moment that the Pentagon cooked up this idea on its own. The military reports to the executive branch and they wouldn't have put this plan in motion without directions from the White House. This is simply another example of Joe Biden thumbing his nose at the normal rules of order and the Constitution, doing whatever he pleases if Congress won't bow to his demands. Of course, that's how he's been operating since taking office, so any of us who feign surprise at this move are just in denial.

I fully support prioritizing the need to secure America's southern border ahead of any other foreign policy decisions. At the same time, however, something is going to have to give in Ukraine in the near future. Just yesterday, Ukrainian forces attempted an incursion into Russian territory, but the Russians reportedly beat them back, inflicting heavy casualties. Zelensky is running low on troops as well as bullets. 

Meanwhile, it's being reported that Russia is manufacturing three times more ammunition for itself than the United States and Europe combined are making for Ukraine. They are firing, on average, 10,000 artillery rounds per day as compared to only 2,000 coming from Ukraine. The more these disparities grow and the more Russia is able to advance the battle lines (no matter how long it takes or how many lives are lost), the less likely Vladimir Putin will be to come to the table for serious peace talks. Joe Biden's strategy of "whatever it takes for as long as it takes" simply isn't working. Ukraine could still lose this war entirely. If so, all of the blood and the sweat and the tears - not to mention the cash - will have been for nothing.