Biden administration slowed Ukraine arms shipments until his term was nearly done
By
Erin Banco,
Anastasiia Malenko,
Mike Stone and
Mari Saito
February 3, 20253:00 AM MSTUpdated a day ago
DNIPROPETROVSK OBLAST, Ukraine - It’s been months since the Ukrainian battalion stationed on the frosty, rutted frontline has received a new armored personnel carrier to take men forward, supply munitions and evacuate the wounded.
The battalion and others like it are the endpoint in a complex chain moving
American military equipment to the front in eastern Ukraine.
For a unit commander, who goes by the callsign Tyson, any delay in that chain is a matter of life or death. The armored vehicles,
supplied by the U.S. and its allies, are prized because even old ones are safer than the Soviet-era equipment usually available to Ukrainian forces.
“When we don’t have enough cars, we’re not able to get the injured,” Tyson said, shifting his feet in the sticky January mud of a training field where he waited for vehicle repairs. Icy winds fluttered the camouflage netting concealing the vehicle.
“When we didn't make it in time, they died,” he said.
In the final year of President Joe Biden’s term, decisions on key shipments and weapons in Ukraine were
stalled not just by months of congressional delays, but also by internal debates over escalation risks with Russia, as well as concerns over whether the U.S. stockpile was sufficient, a Reuters investigation found. Adding to the confusion was a chaotic weapons-tracking system in which even the definition of “delivered” differed among U.S. military branches.