Here are the stats: Trump said the U.S. gave Ukraine $350 billion in aid. That’s not true. In fact, the U.S. contributions are $66 billion in military, and $54 billion in non-military aid, totaling $119 billion. The European Union gave more— $73 billion in military, and $53 billion in non-military assistance, totaling $126 billion.
By contrast, we spent almost $5 trillion on the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, $120 billion in Vietnam, got reimbursed nothing and lost 53,000-plus American lives. We lost over 100,000 American lives combined fighting communism in Korea and Vietnam, the same communism that Vlad Putin represented as a dreaded KGB officer and a brutal dictator.
It is also Russia who gave hundreds of billions worth of weapons to our adversaries to kill American troops and it was Putin who paid a bounty to the Taliban to kill Americans and paid Russian mercenaries to attack American bases in Syria in 2022. Now we see it is Ukraine that is spilling its blood to protect its freedom and democracy against the defacto communist regime of Putin and his dream of restoring the Soviet empire.
Zelensky has offered $35 billion in mineral royalties to pay for its aid. But since they are the ones paying and dying to protect freedom and democracy, perhaps Trump should be kissing his behind. For it is Zelensky who is a Ukrainian Winston Churchill and is carrying the torch of liberty and freedom that we once carried.
James Aker
Orr