Ukraine War Comes with GARGANTUAN Price Tag for US Taxpayers

Throughout the course of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, the world has been rather curious about just how far the conflict would spread from there, all thanks to the abject lunacy of the Kremlin.

Russia has long yearned for some grander vision of itself, but has been completely unwilling to use peaceful means to achieve it.  Instead, Vladimir Putin has made a number of flimsy excuses for his invasion, all the while threatening to use nuclear weapons against anyone who would dare to intervene directly.

So, instead, the western world has sent a vast number of resources into the region, hoping to snuff out whatever hope Russia had of still conquering Kyiv.

The price tag for this assistance is hefty, to say the least.

U.S. taxpayers have poured nearly $80 billion into this war over the past 14 months or so. At what point are we allowed to ask whether a “stalemate” in a “grinding campaign of attrition” is a good deal for Americans?

Above all, Americans should demand the bipartisan Washington consensus that supports indefinitely funding this war explain what our strategy is, define what the American interest is in it, and detail how they plan to achieve something beyond an interminable war of attrition that risks pulling us into direct conflict with nuclear-armed Russia. At the very least, the American people deserve more than inane platitudes from Antony Blinken about “Ukrainian victory” and “standing united with Ukraine for as long as it takes,” as if total Russian defeat and withdrawal is a realistic outcome.

The classified documents lend some urgency to these questions because they reveal, among other things, a severe shortage of air defense weapons in Ukraine — so severe it could mean the difference between an ongoing stalemate or a Russian victory in the coming weeks or months. Without adequate air defenses, Russian warplanes will be able to bomb Ukrainian positions at will, which in turn might make Ukraine’s planned spring offensive impossible. No wonder then that earlier this month the Biden administration pledged $2.6 billion in air defense systems to Ukraine.

And it’s not just about the money.

One of the results of this slow, grinding warfare has been the rapid expenditure of munitions, at least on the Ukrainian side. U.S. weapons stockpiles are now depleted, and our defense industrial base is taxed to the point that we have been unable to deliver some $20 billion in promised military supplies to Taiwan. This of course raises the question of China, which the Biden administration, along with Republican leaders in Congress, refuse to talk about candidly in the context of the Ukraine war.

The news will almost certainly become a hot topic in Washington DC, as it appears as though the indefinite nature of this potential stalemate continues to bleed our nation dry.