Senate Armed Services Committee Chairman John McCain pressed Saturday for the United States to arm Ukraine, calling a shaky ceasefire in the eastern part of that country a “fiction.”
“It is time that the United States and our European allies recognize the failure of the Minsk agreement and respond with more than empty rhetoric,” the Arizona Republican wrote in the Washington Post.
“Ukraine’s leaders describe Russian President Vladimir Putin’s strategy as a game of Pac-Man — taking bite after bite out of Ukraine in small enough portions that it does not trigger a large-scale international response. But at this point it should be clear to all that Putin does not want a diplomatic solution to the conflict. He wants to dominate Ukraine, along with Russia’s other neighbors.”
The House and the Senate have passed legislation authorizing the supply of U.S. weapons to Ukraine’s armed forces in addition to the nonlethal military aid already being provided. McCain is the lead sponsor of the Senate bill, which calls for at least 20 percent of the $300 million in military aid to Ukraine be earmarked for defensive weapons.
“No one in the West wants a return to the Cold War. But we must recognize that we are confronting a Russian ruler who seeks exactly that,” McCain wrote. “We must do more to deter Russia by increasing the military costs of its aggression, starting with the immediate provision of the defensive weapons and other assistance the Ukrainians desperately need.”
President Obama has so far refused to arm the Ukrainians, and key U.S. allies such as France and Germany also oppose the idea. Administration officials have said they fear arming Ukraine will encourage Putin to escalate the conflict, and prefer to stick with a combination of economic sanctions and an increased rotation of U.S. forces in NATO countries bordering Russia, as well as training exercises with Ukrainian troops, to get Moscow to honor a peace deal reached in Minsk in February.
But NATO officials say Russia has continued to arm and train rebels in eastern Ukraine and also maintains its own troops inside that country in defiance of the ceasefire.
In a phone call with Putin on Thursday, Obama “reiterated the need for Russia to fulfill its commitments under the Minsk agreements, including the removal of all Russian troops and equipment from Ukrainian territory,” the White House said.
