U.S. Will Not Send Troops To Ukraine, State Dept Says
The United States on Tuesday ruled out sending its troops to fight in Ukraine, in response to French President Emmanuel Macron’s recent remark suggesting that Western troops in Ukraine “cannot be ruled out,” TURAN’s Washington correspondent reports.
“President [Joe] Biden has made clear, going back more than two years to before even Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, that he will not send U.S. soldiers to fight in Ukraine,” State Department’s Spokesperson Matthew Miller told a daily briefing in response to TURAN’s questions.
Macron had made his comments while hosting 27 EU nation representatives at an aid summit in Paris on Monday. “There’s no consensus today to send in an official, endorsed manner troops on the ground. But in terms of dynamics, nothing can be ruled out,” the French leader was quoted as saying.
Many European leaders, including representatives from the U.K., Italy, Spain, Poland, the Czech Republic, Hungary and others quickly distanced themselves from the notion that troops are an option in Ukraine.
As for the U.S., Miller said getting lethal aid for Kyiv passed by Congress, is “the path to victory.”
“Certainly, every country is free to speak to its own interest, but in addition to the president making clear that the US will not send troops to fight in Ukraine, the NATO secretary general has ruled out any NATO troops to fight in Ukraine,” he went on to add.
The spokesperson also spoke about the current state of play on the battlefield.
“The situation is extremely serious right now,” Miller told TURAN’s correspondent. “… We have seen Ukrainian frontline troops who don’t have the ammo they need to repel Russian aggression. They’re still fighting bravely. They’re still fighting courageously. They still have armor and weapons and ammunition they can use, but they’re having to ration it now because the U.S. Congress has failed to act.”
Washington expects that for the remainder of the year Ukrainian forces will “continue to fight bravely and they will make advances, as they have done most significantly in the Black Sea as of late. But it will be much tougher for them if they don’t have access to the ammunition,” Miller concluded.
Deep divisions between the Biden administration and some Republican leaders over Ukraine and border security were also laid bare at the White House yesterday afternoon as Biden met with four congressional leaders.
According to the White House readout of the meeting, Biden “discussed how Ukraine has lost ground on the battlefield in recent weeks and is being forced to ration ammunition and supplies due to Congressional inaction,”
He “underscored the importance of the bipartisan national security supplemental, which passed the Senate with overwhelming bipartisan support and would pass in the House if it was brought to a vote,” reads the readout.