President joe biden pledges to support Ukraine “as long as it takes”. His administration has so far spent about $8bn on military aid alone for it. In May, Congress passed a $40bn supplemental budget—more than Mr Biden had asked for, and more than the annual defence budgets of most European allies—to assist Ukraine and deal with the global consequences of the war.
But nearly six months into the fight, with the prospect of a long war to come, even Mr Biden’s closest allies are asking whether America might soon tire of the burden. The president is more unpopular even than Donald Trump was at this point in his presidency. Inflation and high fuel prices are weakening Americans’ spending power. And Republicans are set to make important gains in mid-term elections in November: they are expected to take control of the House of Representatives and possibly also the Senate.
Chris Coons, a Democratic senator and close ally of Mr Biden’s—sometimes called the president’s “shadow secretary of state”—recently wrote a commentary praising nato’s show of unity at its summit in Madrid last month. It added: “I am concerned about the commitment of the American people and its elected leaders to stay the course as the invasion grinds on.” Vladimir Putin, Russia’s leader, “is counting on the West losing focus”, he told The Economist on July 14th.
The aid for Ukraine is intended to last until the end of the fiscal year on September 30th, but nobody is quite sure when the money will run out. Few in Congress think another large package for Ukraine can be passed before the mid-terms, and many say it could remain difficult thereafter. “It will be an uphill battle,” says a Republican Senate staffer. “The sales pitch from the last time is not good enough now, because the war has fundamentally changed and the domestic situation at home is different.”
Given the country’s acute polarisation, it is perhaps no surprise that Republicans should be sceptical of a proxy war conducted by a Democratic administration. Fewer Americans overall are prepared to pay an economic price for supporting Ukraine than were at the onset of war in March. But a recent poll for the University of Maryland finds that the gap between Democrats and Republicans is widening, too. Among Democrats, 78% would accept costlier fuel and 72% would bear more inflation to help Ukraine; among Republicans only 44% and 39% respectively would do so.
Congressional aides say three factors are likely to affect support for Ukraine. First is the complexion of Congress after the mid-terms. If Republicans retake one or both chambers, which faction in the party will have the upper hand? The establishment sort such as Mitch McConnell, the Senate minority leader who in May took senior colleagues to Kyiv to meet Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelensky? Or the devotees of Mr Trump and his maga (“Make America Great Again”) nativism?
Mr Trump still holds much of his party in thrall. He denounced the last aid package for Ukraine, saying: “The Democrats are sending another $40bn to Ukraine, yet America’s parents are struggling to even feed their children.” His base could be energised if, in the coming weeks, he announces his intention to run for president again in 2024. Meanwhile, unexpected trouble has come from Victoria Spartz, a Ukrainian-born Republican in the House who had once urged Mr Biden to act more decisively in Ukraine, but has recently taken to accusing some of Mr Zelensky’s aides of corruption.
“Fact is if the Republicans take over the House in 2022 us support to Ukraine will come to a halt,” tweeted Ruben Gallego, a House Democrat. Republican leaders, he predicted, would not be able to stop Trumpists like Marjorie Taylor Greene and Matt Gaetz “from dictating our Ukraine policy”. Mr Gaetz shot back: “Ruben is correct.”
Such boasting amounts to “wish-casting”, says Eric Edelman, a former senior Pentagon official under George W. Bush. maga disciples are still a minority among congressional Republicans but, he frets, could grow larger after the mid-terms. If they make up a bigger share of Republicans in the House, where spending bills originate, and particularly if they hold the balance of power, providing more aid to Ukraine will become harder. Kevin McCarthy, the Republican leader of the House, regards Mr Zelensky as a “modern-day Winston Churchill”. But few expect him to offer much resistance to the Trumpian right. Pressure will mount on the Senate (whether controlled by Democrats or Mr McConnell’s Republicans) to tame the excesses of maga-world. The matter of Ukraine, says Mr Edelman, “is a surrogate for the larger battle for the soul of the Republican Party”.
A second factor is the extent to which allies are willing to keep helping Ukraine confront Russia. “How much are our European partners doing? That’s literally the first question I get,” says Mr Coons. For most Americans, he notes, Ukraine is “half a world away”. European countries are closer to Russia’s military threat, and also more vulnerable to the danger of escalation, the loss of Russian energy supplies and the outflow of refugees.
Perhaps the biggest consideration is the third factor: progress on the battlefield. If the Biden administration can show that Ukraine is gaining ground, rather than being bogged down in another “forever war”, support for the country will be easier to rally. But a protracted conflict looks all too likely. Ukraine has had success of late in using American-supplied himars, a guided-missile launcher, to strike at command posts and ammunition dumps behind Russia’s front lines. But Ukrainian forces are still heavily outgunned and on the defensive, if not still retreating.
Mr Biden’s aim in the war is unclear. His administration has stopped talking about helping Ukraine to “win”, and instead speaks of preventing it from being defeated. It is delivering himars in small packages of four launchers at a time. (It claims it needs time to train Ukrainian forces.) But Mr Biden’s main concern is to avoid a direct conflict between nato and a nuclear-armed Russia. America has demanded assurances that the 84km-range gmlrs munitions provided with himars will not be fired at Russian territory; it has so far refused to provide the atacms munition which has a range of about 300km.
To some the war is unwinnable. They say the Biden administration should make haste to find a diplomatic deal. But for Ukraine’s supporters, whether Democratic or Republican, the answer is for Mr Biden to hurry up and win: give Ukraine more military help, do it faster and accept more risk. Mr Edelman has this warning for the Biden team: “If they think stalemate is the answer, or even if they are not intentionally playing for a stalemate, they’re going to lose on the battlefield, and they’re going to lose the battle for public opinion at home.”
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