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Joe Biden Needs to Stop Fueling 'Unwinnable' Proxy War in Ukraine, Says US Ex-Intel Officer

© ANDREW CABALLERO-REYNOLDSThe dome of the US Capitol is seen reflected on a car door in Washington, DC on November 5, 2021.
The dome of the US Capitol is seen reflected on a car door in Washington, DC on November 5, 2021. - Sputnik International, 1920, 14.12.2022
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It was imperative that US Commander-in-chief Joe Biden initiate a “prudent de-escalation strategy,” ex-intelligence officer Rebekah Koffler warned in October, underscoring the risks of “misunderstanding and miscalculation” dragging the United States into a Russia-NATO conflict.
US President Joe Biden has been urged to stop “fueling” the conflagration in Ukraine.
“Common sense dictates the Russia-Ukraine conflict must end, and serious effort should be invested in achieving the peace settlement,” Rebekah Koffler, a former Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) officer, has stated.
The Biden administration was spending taxpayer money and increasingly depleting its own defensive arsenal by fighting an “unwinnable” proxy war with Russia, the president of Doctrine & Strategy Consulting underscored in a US media interview on 12 December.
Ukraine’s President, Volodymyr Zelensky, continues to pursue “unrealistic war aims” and, until recently, has insisted he would only negotiate with a new Russian president, which is "clearly not a serious condition" for talks, Koffler insists.
Nevertheless, Washington’s determination to prop up the Kiev regime has left both its own defense department and its NATO allies finding it increasingly difficult to top up their own diminishing stocks, the former intel officer emphasized.
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Citing US media reports that there was an alleged $19Bln backlog of weapons earmarked for Taiwan amid increasing tensions with China, Koffler pointed out that Washington was jeopardizing its own long-term plans to arm the Taipei government.
Furthermore, the Pentagon, which has been delivering weapons to the Kiev regime since Russia began its special military operation in Ukraine, has used up 13 years' of Stinger production in a matter of 10 months, along with five years' Javelin production, according to Raytheon’s chief executive.
“US defense industry production capacity to restock those inventories is extremely limited. US security aid in November reached $68Bln, and the Biden administration has asked Congress for another $37.7Bln,” emphasized Koffler.
As for financial aid to Kiev, it is becoming ever more challenging to convince American and European governments to dole out hefty sums of cash from their coffers. Washington’s aid to Kiev has exceeded 50 percent of Ukraine’s 2021 GDP of $200.1Bln, Koffler said, warning that such aid could not continue indefinitely.
A poll published on 5 December revealed that nearly half of Americans (47 percent) are of the opinion that the US should push Kiev authorities to settle for peace. This was an increase from 38 percent who voiced such a stance in July.
According to the former DIA officer, it is likely that Zelensky’s recent plea for another $55Bln may fall on deaf ears.
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Despite the Biden administration significantly “scaling down” its goals in the Ukraine conflict, it “still operates in the wishful thinking paradigm”, Koffler highlighted.
She cited the recent “agenda” articulated by US Secretary of State, Antony Blinken on 5 December, at the WSJ cheif executive council summit. That plan had suggested that Russia would be “pushed back” to “pre-invasion lines”, in a reference to the Kherson and Zaporozhye regions, which held referendums between 23 and 27 September to decide whether they wanted to join Russia. After the people demonstrated overwhelming support for the motion the two regions joined the Donetsk and Lugansk people's republics to become part of the Russian Federation.
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If Washington were to consider supporting Kiev’s moves to achieve such an “agenda”, it would require “massive additional outlays in military hardware”, warned the former intelligence officer, and would be fraught with further risks of an outright confrontation between Russia and NATO. This is something that Koffler warned about in October. She had highlighted the risks of “misunderstanding and miscalculation” dragging the US into a Russia-NATO conflagration. She also urged that Biden initiate a “prudent de-escalation strategy.”
The Biden administration, according to Koffler, is probably "coming to a realization that at some point you run out of taxpayer money and your own defensive arsenal if you continue fueling a war that is unwinnable."
As western countries have been providing Kiev with humanitarian, military and financial aid amid Russia’s special operation, Moscow repeatedly denounced the flow of weapons. Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov has stressed that any cargo containing weapons for Ukraine would be considered a legitimate target for Russia.
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