Pentagon SITREP on Ukraine War, Biden: Prepare for a ”Long, Difficult, $$$$$ War

WHITEHOUSE: From Biden:

Now — I want to be honest with you: This could be a long and difficult battle. 

In fact, we started our assistance to Ukraine before this war began, as they started to do exercises along the Ukrainian border — the Russians — starting in March of last year.

     We took the threat of Putin invading very seriously, and we acted on it.  We sent Ukraine more security assistance last year — $650 million in weapons, including anti-air and anti-armor equipment before the invasion — more than we had ever provided before.  So when the invasion began, they already had in their hands the kinds of weapons they needed to counter Russian advances.

And once the war started, we immediately rushed $350 million in additional aid to further address their needs: hundreds of anti-air systems, thousands of anti-tank weapons, transport helicopters, armed patrol boats, and other high-mobility vehicles, radar systems that help track incoming artillery and unmanned drones, secure communications equipment and tactical gear, satellite imagery and — and analysis capacity.  And it’s clearly helped Ukraine inflict dramatic losses on Russian forces.      

On Saturday, my administration authorized another $200 million to keep a steady flow of weapons and ammunition moving to Ukraine.  Now I’m once again using my presidential authority to activate — to activate additional security assistance to continue to help Ukraine fend off Russia’s assault — an additional $800 million in assistance.  That brings the total of new U.S. security assistance to Ukraine to $1 billion just this week.  These are the lar- — these are direct transfers of equipment from our Department of Defense to the Ukrainian military to help them as they fight against this invasion.   

And I thank the Congress for appropriating these funds. 

This new package on its own is going to provide unprecedented assistance to Ukraine.  It includes 800 anti-aircraft systems to make sure the Ukrainian military can continue to — can continue to stop the planes and helicopters that have been attacking their people and to defend their Ukrainian airspace.  

And at the request of President Zelenskyy, we have identified and are helping Ukraine acquire additional longer-range anti-aircraft systems and the munitions for those systems.  

Our new assistance package also includes 9,000 anti-armor systems.  These are portable, high — high-accurate — high accurately — high-accuracy shoulder-mounted missiles that the Ukrainian forces have been using with great effect to destroy invading tanks and armored vehicles.   

It’ll include 7,000 small arms — machine guns, shotguns, grenade launchers — to equip the Ukrainians, including the brave women and men who are defending their cities as civilians, and they’re on the countryside as well.  And we’re — and we — and as well as the ammunition, artillery, and mortar rounds to go with small arms — 20 million rounds in total.  Twenty million rounds.  And this will include drones, which — which demonstrates our commitment to sending our most cutting-edge systems to Ukraine for its defense. 

SecDef Austin was on the Board of Raytheon, now profiting from the Ukraine War.

DOD Official: Ukrainian Fighters Continue to Hold Off Russia From Invading Kyiv

By, Terri Moon Cronk, Todd Lopez

Ukrainian forces have continued to hold off Russian attempts at invading the Ukraine capital of Kyiv by about 15 km to the northwest and about 30 km to the east in the past 24 hours, according to a senior Defense Department official, who added there have been “no real changes by the Russians on the ground near Kyiv,” in a briefing today. 

The official said the United States assesses the Russians have launched more than 1,100 missiles since they invaded Ukraine 27 days ago on February 24. 

The Russians are coming down out of Kharkiv, Ukraine, toward Izium, to the southeast of Kharkiv which is believed to be an attempt to cut off the joint force operations area that’s basically the Donbas, he said. “That’s one reason — not the only reason — why we think [the Russians] are so interested in Mariupol; so they can come up from the south and down from the north from Izium,” where the Ukrainians are fighting hard to take back the city from the Russians, he added. 

“We observed over the last 24 hours that the Russians have likely been firing into [Mariupol] from the Sea of Azov,” the official said. “Just to the south of Mariupol, we assess that they’ve got about [seven] ships in the Sea of Azov and we think some of them — at least the surface combatants … have been shelling into Mariupol and that wasn’t the case yesterday.” 

Not all of those seven ships are surface combatants, he said, adding that a minesweeper is amid the fleet with a couple of tank landing ships. A change from yesterday.  

“We continue to observe a number of Russian forces inside the city. We think at least some of them are separatist forces that came from Donbas, and the Ukrainians are fighting very hard to keep Mariupol from falling,” the official said. 

There has also not been much change in the airspace, he said. “[We] did not observe shelling of Odesa from the Black Sea over the last 24 hours, but we still assess that they have several warships that are in the northern Black Sea. [It’s] like all maritime environment — it changes, so I can’t say with certainty that it’s the same number of ships, or that they’re in the same location as they were yesterday.”  

But the United States assesses naval activity in the northern Black Sea and no indication there is an imminent amphibious assault on or near Odesa, he added. 

Today, DOD has assessed for the first time that the Russians might be slightly below a 90% level of assessed available combat power, the official noted, emphasizing that number comprises Russian combat power assembled in Belarus prior to the invasion in Ukraine, and it is not an assessment of all Russian military power.  

There also are no tangible indications of Russian reinforcements coming in or foreign fighters that have flown into the country, he said, adding, “We do assess the Wagner Group [Russian mercenaries] is active in Ukraine [and] we think that activity is largely in the Donbas area.”  

“[But] we do continue to see indications that [the Russians] are having these discussions about reinforcements and foreign fighters and they are making those kinds of plans, both in terms of resupply and also reinforcement. It’s just that we haven’t seen that actually take place,” the official said. 

“It appears as if a lot of these operations are being conducted in silos, not necessarily integrated across the force,” Kirby said. 

On Thursday of last week, the president committed an additional $800 million in security assistance to the Ukrainians including 800 Stinger anti-aircraft systems, 2,000 Javelin anti-tank missile systems, 1,000 light anti-armor weapons, 6,000 AT-4 anti-armor systems and 100 tactical unmanned aerial systems. 

Kirby said the Defense Department is now actively working to fill out this most recent drawdown package for Ukraine and that “shipments will be arriving very, very soon.”

AFP confirms reports: “Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov has accused the United States of wanting to hinder Moscow’s talks with Ukraine aimed at ending the almost month-long conflict.”