Russia's foreign ministry condemned the decision of Ecuador to hand over old Russian-made military hardware from its stocks to the U.S. for use in Ukraine, Russian state-controlled news agency RIA Novosti reported on Feb. 2.
The Ecuadorian government announced last month that it would send what it called “Ukrainian and Russian scrap metal” to the U.S. in exchange for modern equipment worth $200 million, according to Reuters.
scratches chin
Hmm. This sounds like what happens is maybe that we may not have funds budgeted to send aid to Ukraine, but do have funds budgeted to send aid to Ecuador.
QUITO, Dec 13 (Reuters) - Ecuador expects to seal a deal for the United States to provide $200 million worth of security equipment and support as it tackles rising violence on the streets and in prisons blamed on drug trafficking gangs, the government said on Wednesday.
As the Republican Party’s blockade of aid to Ukraine drags into its fourth month, the U.S. government under Pres. Joe Biden has found a clever new way to give Ukraine’s forces the weapons and ammunition they need to defend their country.
It is, in essence, an American version of Germany’s circular weapons trade—the so-called Ringtausch. The United States is gifting older surplus weapons to Greece with the understanding that Greece donates to Ukraine some of its own surplus weapons.
Greek media broke the news last week. According to the newspaper Kathimerini and other media, the Biden administration offered the Greek government three 87-foot Protector-class patrol boats, two Lockheed Martin C-130H airlifters, 10 Allison T56 turboprop engines for Lockheed P-3 patrol planes plus 60 M-2 Bradley fighting vehicles and a consignment of transport trucks.
All this hardware is U.S. military surplus—and is available to Greece, free of charge, under a U.S. legal authority called “excess defense articles.” Federal law allows an American president to declare military systems surplus to need, assign them a value—potentially zero dollars—and give them away on the condition that the recipient transport them.
The law caps annual EDA transfers at $500 million. The same law doesn’t dictate the value the president assigns to surplus weapons. In a letter to Greek prime minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken described the ships, planes, engines and vehicles as “free concessions.”
The EDA gifts to Greece sweeten a larger arms package that includes 40 Lockheed F-35 stealth fighters, which Greece is buying for $8.6 billion. The Biden administration previously approved, in 2022 and 2023, $60 million in financing for arms-purchases by Athens.
In exchange for this largess, the Americans want the Greeks to donate more weapons to the Ukrainians. “We continue to be interested in the defense capabilities that Greece could transfer or sell to Ukraine,” Blinken wrote.
The Americans even offered a reward once the donation is complete. “If these capabilities are of interest to Ukraine, and pending an assessment of their status and value by the U.S. government, we can explore opportunities for possible additional foreign armed forces financing of up to $200 million for Greece.”
This sounds like a good year to be a country looking to trade in a bunch of weapons for some flashy new ones.
Probably not the most economically-efficient way to get aid to Ukraine, but I suppose politics are a cost of doing business.
It's been like that from the start. Even my country traded obsolete tanks to Ukraine for some other weapons last year or even the year before. Most countries are not that sympathetic I guess, they just see a good deal.
edit: for->to
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