March 17, 2023
The Surprising Success of U.S. Military Aid to Ukraine
Ukraine’s military has defied expectations in its war with Russia, and many analysts attribute its success to U.S. help. But the mere fact of receiving aid is no guarantee of a positive outcome. After all, the United States provides security assistance to many countries with mixed results. Billions of dollars in aid and decades of training, advising, and institution building did not stop the armies of Afghanistan and Iraq from collapsing. Smaller scale efforts around the world have produced so-called Fabergé egg armies, militaries that are expensive to build but easy to crack.
What Ukraine needs now from the United States to beat back the Russian invasion is weapons and ammunition.
One of the main reasons security assistance has succeeded in buttressing the Ukrainian war effort but failed elsewhere has to do with the motivation of Ukraine’s leadership. If leaders are not prepared to prioritize institutional reforms that will strengthen their militaries, then foreign support will be of little consequence. Ukraine’s experience is telling. Between 2014 and early 2022, Ukrainian officials were glad to receive U.S. help, and they followed U.S. advice in making changes that improved the effectiveness of Ukrainian forces. But they did not embrace institutional reforms that threatened the political or personal interests of powerful constituencies.
Read the full article from Foreign Affairs.
More from CNAS
-
Uncrewed but Confident: Forging New Rules of the Road to Avoid Accidental Escalation
Air and maritime uncrewed platforms in the Indo-Pacific may be a promising area for developing new confidence-building measures....
By Tom Shugart
-
Stacie Pettyjohn on drones in Ukraine
The Merge podcast hosts Dr. Stacie Pettyjohn to discuss her new report: Evolution Not Revolution, Drone Warfare in Russia’s 2022 Invasion of Ukraine Stacie is a Senior Fel...
By Stacie Pettyjohn
-
How China’s $100B+ Shipbuilding Empire Dominates the U.S.’s
China has transformed into a shipbuilding powerhouse over the past two decades, cementing its status as a major maritime power. In 2023, more than half of the world’s commerci...
By Tom Shugart
-
Ukrainian president has stark new warning as war rages on
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky warns that Ukraine will lose the war with Russia without US assistance. Franz-Stefan Gady of CNAS explains why US military aid is crucia...
By Franz-Stefan Gady