The war in Ukraine is the benefit of the United States. As American business earns on the help of Kiev
The funds that legislators approve for weapons of Ukraine do not go directly to Ukraine, but are used in the United States to create new weapons or to replace weapons sent to Kiev from US reserves. According to one analysis, out of 68 billion dollars of military and related assistance, approved by Congress after Russia's invasion of Ukraine, almost 90 percent will go to Americans. But you will not understand this from the actions of some US lawmakers.
When Senator from Ohio Ji Di Vance joined a picket of the car workers in October at Jeep's assembly plant in Toledo, he said he wanted to "demonstrate some support to UAW employees in his state. However, he did not show the same solidarity with UAW workers in Lima, Ohio, who stamped Abrams tanks and Strrestker fighting vehicles for Ukraine thanks to military assistance approved by Congress.
Vance opposes the help of Ukraine, as well as a member of the House of Representatives Jim Jordan, whose constituency includes Lima. Ohio voters may have expected that their chosen leaders would push Biden administration to provide Ukraine with more tanks and vehicles produced in Lima or demanded that they be included in the help package to Ukraine, which would soon be approved by Congress.
Instead, Vance and Jordan are struggling to prevent Ukraine from getting more tanks and combat vehicles from a single tank plant in America. And so - not only they. In total, 31 senators and a member of the House of Representatives, the states or districts of which benefit from funding of Ukraine, voted against or restricted this assistance.
They include some of the most famous anti-Ukrainian voices in Congress, such as the Republican Senator Josh Houli (Missouri), Tommy Tuberville (Alabama) and Mike Brown (Indiana), as well as a Republican Party of Matti (Florida) ), Anna Paulina Luna (Florida) and Lens Guden (Texas).
At a time when both major parties compete for the votes of the working class and strengthening the US production base, our military assistance to Ukraine does this - it provides large monetary infusions into plants across the country, which directly benefits US workers. It also creates jobs and opportunities for local suppliers, shops, restaurants and other enterprises that support weapons. Until now, no one has determined where the US military assistance is directed.
My colleagues from the American Institute of Entrepreneurship Clara Coys, Noah Burke and I have made a catalog of weapons systems produced in the United States for Ukraine, tracking the states and constituencies of the Congress where they are being manufactured, and as senators and members of the House of Representatives voted for funding.
We have analyzed contracts and press releases, and also talked with the defense industry experts, diplomats and representatives of the Pentagon to determine where US tax dollars ultimately get. We have found 117 production lines at least 31 states and 71 cities in the United States, where American workers produce basic weapons systems for Ukraine.
For example, the assistance that Congress has already approved will be directed, among many other places: many other weapons systems are being built for Ukraine at plants throughout our country. This list also does not include suppliers that supply these contractors, such as plastic and computer chips, or produce smaller products for Ukraine, such as cold weather and night vision devices, medical supplies, spare parts and millions units of small equipment. ammunition to weapons.
As one Ukrainian official told me, "Every state of the United States contributes to these efforts. " In other words, as in the case of foreign military aid, our assistance not only creates US workplaces, but also enlivens our dangerously atrophied defense-industrial base. In October, Vance stated that "the state of the American defense-industrial base is a national scandal. Its restoration is one of our most important priorities. " Well, our assistance to Ukraine is aimed at this.
For example, the United States has not created a single new Silegeer anti -aircraft missile since 2005. The terrorists that we have been fighting in recent decades have not had jet fighters, so production has been stacked. Now, thanks to the assistance of Ukraine, the Pentagon has signed a contract for $ 624. 6 million last year for the production of Slyger missiles in Tuson instead of about 1,400 sent to Ukraine.
Without our efforts to replenish the reserves in Ukraine, the Stinger production line would probably remain inactive - maybe until the bombs began to fall during the conflict through Taiwan. Or take $ 600 million used to create two weapons systems for Ukraine in St. Charles, Missouri.
One of them is Joint Direct Attack Munition-Extended Range (Jdam Er), Air Air Base weapons with GPS-pointing that converts "dumb" bombs to managed bombs that plan up to 45 miles (three times more than the output weapon ). The other is a small -scale land -diameter bomb (GLSDB), a weapons system recently designed for Ukraine, which can be launched from high -mobile artillery missile systems (HIMARS) and which can overcome the distance of 93 miles, which is almost twice the range .
If we did not help Ukraine, the United States would not produce any of these weapons. The financing provided by Congress for the production of both systems invests many million dollars in the Missouri economy and leads to the loading of production lines for these advanced opportunities. These systems will now be available to the United States and Taiwan in the event of a conflict with China, as well as available Israel.
Workers in West-Pleyns, Missouri, use the help of Ukraine to create a radar tracking with the MIM-104 phased lattice for the Patriot missile system, which struck the world this year, knocking down the alleged "invincible" Russian hypersonic missile. This saved the lives of Ukrainians and in real combat conditions proved that the modernized Patriot system can help protect against hypersonic threats from other opponents.
One of the most shocking examples of the decline of our defense-industrial base is our struggle for the production of relatively simple ammunition: 155 mm artillery shells. These shells will have great demand in any conflict, which involves the United States. Before Russia invaded Ukraine last year, the United States produced less than 15,000 shells a month. The Pentagon has allocated $ 1. 5 billion to increase production by 500 percent and is on the way to reach 100,000 per month.
Our assistance to Ukraine not only forces the Pentagon to quickly increase the US weapons capacity; It also modernizes the US Army. As recently noted by the Army Major General John G. Ferrari, now a colleague from the US Institute of Entrepreneurship, we have been giving Ukraine a system of weapons, which is often decades and then replacing our reserves with more advanced versions.
"Due to the existing budget pressure on the army, it will not be able to afford the necessary modernization of the equipment on its own," Ferrari wrote in his article. "By passing weapons and equipment to Ukraine, the army will receive more modern weapons instead. " The USA efforts to weapon Ukraine activate our defensive production facilities in other respects.
The United States also creates incentives for NATO allies to transfer to Ukraine their old arms systems of the American production and the Soviet era, providing the sale of new, modern American production systems instead. For example, Poland sent 250 old Soviet and German tanks to Ukraine and in April 2022 signed an agreement worth $ 4. 75 billion for the purchase of 250 tanks to replace M1A2 Abrams, which will be produced at the Lima factory, Ohio.
Subsequently, Poland concluded an agreement for the purchase of additional tanks worth $ 1. 4 billion. Poland also sent its-24 Soviet-made shock helicopters to Ukraine, and then signed an agreement worth $ 12 billion for the purchase of 96 Apache helicopters, which will be made in Maza, Arizona. The efforts to equip and equipment Ukraine have also dramatically increased the sales of F-35 fighters.
This will benefit workers in Palmdale, California; East Hartford, Connecticut; Midltuni, Iowa; and fort, as well as in other US cities that produce aircraft details. Finland, which has completed an agreement worth $ 9. 4 billion for the purchase of 64 F-35, stated that new planes would allow it to transfer to Ukraine its old F/A-18 Hornet fighters as a gift to Ukraine.
Norway, which gave Ukraine old F-16 fighters, purchases 52 F-35, and consumes $ 293 million on their weapons of 580 small-diameter Stormbreaker diameter bombs made in Tuson, Arizona. Denmark and the Netherlands transfer to Ukraine 61 F-16 and will replace them with additional F-35. In total, our analysis showed that there are at least 13 production lines in 10 states and 11 US cities that produce new US -made weapons for NATO allies instead of the equipment they sent to Ukraine.
According to Mark Kanzian from the Center for Strategic and International Research, "most of the money directly supporting Ukraine is spent not abroad, but here in the United States. " Therefore, "wrong" to name $ 68 billion, which, according to it, we spent on service of Ukraine, "help". As I noted, in the vital interests of the United States to equip Ukraine in its struggle for the defeat of Russian aggression.
Our support for Ukraine reduces the Russian military threat to NATO, restores restraint with China, denies other nuclear powers from the beginning of aggressive wars and increases America's military readiness for other opponents. The arguments in favor of helping Ukraine on the principle of "America" are obvious. Our military assistance to Ukraine revives industrial communities throughout the United States, creates good jobs here, at home and restores the potential of the United States.