Biden OK’d Dutch F-16s to Ukraine. Will Putin’s pal defendant Donald Trump call out his Congress goons to block F-16s to Ukraine? Ukraine is fighting our primary enemy on the cheap. About 5.6 % of U.S. defense spending.

 "Washington’s decision not to block allies from sending F-16s comes after Zelensky’s repeated requests for fighter jets, including from the Netherlands, which has the aircraft. In February, Ukrainian officials said they had made significant progress in convincing Dutch officials to send F-16s, but Washington’s approval is necessary given third-party transfer agreements made during the purchase of the U.S.-made jets. The transfer would also require the sign-off of the chairs and ranking minority-party members of relevant U.S. congressional committees.”

“The Pentagon has overestimated the cost of weapons it supplied to Ukraine by at least $3 billion, the Associated Press reported. The miscalculation will allow the Defense Department to send more weapons without requesting more funding from Congress, according to the AP.”

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Ukraine live briefing: U.S. won’t block Europe’s F-16 exports for Kyiv; Zelensky expected at G-7 summit

Michelle Ye Hee Lee

Updated May 19, 2023 at 5:15 a.m. EDT| Published May 19, 2023 at 1:45 a.m. EDT

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"A new analysis by the Center for European Policy Analysis finds that congressionally approved funds to support Ukraine this year amount to about 5.6 percent of U.S. defense spending, while resulting in a significant degrading of Russia’s military:

Altogether, the Biden administration received Congressional approval for $40bn in aid for Ukraine for 2022 and has requested an additional $37.7bn for 2022. More than half of this aid has been earmarked for defense.

These sums pale into insignificance when set against a total US defense budget of $715bn for 2022. The assistance represents 5.6% of total US defense spending. But Russia is a primary adversary of the US, a top tier rival not too far behind China, its number one strategic challenger. In cold, geopolitical terms, this war provides a prime opportunity for the US to erode and degrade Russia’s conventional defense capability, with no boots on the ground and little risk to US lives.

The Ukrainian armed forces have already killed or wounded upwards of 100,000 Russian troops, half its original fighting force; there have been almost 8,000 confirmed losses of armored vehicles including thousands of tanks, thousands of APCs, artillery pieces, hundreds of fixed and rotary wing aircraft, and numerous naval vessels. US spending of 5.6% of its defense budget to destroy nearly half of Russia’s conventional military capability seems like an absolutely incredible investment. If we divide out the US defense budget to the threats it faces, Russia would perhaps be of the order of $100bn-150bn in spend-to-threat. So spending just $40bn a year, erodes a threat value of $100-150bn, a two-to-three time return.  Actually the return is likely to be multiples of this given that defense spending, and threat are annual recurring events."

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National Review

Aid to Ukraine Is a Small Fraction of the U.S. Defense Budget

Jimmy Quinn November 21, 2022 12:15 PM