Reuters
[Source: Reuters]
The United States will send Ukraine $725 million of missiles, ammunition, anti-personnel mines and other weapons, Secretary of State Antony Blinken said on Monday, as President Joe Biden’s outgoing administration seeks to bolster Kyiv in its war with Russian invaders before leaving office in January.
The assistance will include Stinger missiles, ammunition for High Mobility Artillery Rocket Systems (HIMARS), drones and land mines, among other items, Blinken said in a statement.
Reuters reported last week that the Biden administration planned to provide the equipment, much of it anti-tank weapons, to ward off Russia’s attacking forces.
Moscow’s troops have been capturing village after village in Ukraine’s east, part of a drive to seize the industrial Donbas region, while Russian airstrikes target a hobbled Ukrainian energy grid as winter sets in.
The announcement marks a steep uptick in size from Biden’s recent use of so-called Presidential Drawdown Authority (PDA), which allows the U.S. to draw from current weapons stocks to help allies in an emergency.
Recent PDA announcements have typically ranged from $125 million to $250 million. Biden has an estimated $4 billion to $5 billion in PDA already authorized by Congress that he is expected to use for Ukraine before Republican President-elect Donald Trump takes office on Jan. 20.
