The leaders of national security committees in the House have called reports that the Pentagon miscalculated the value of weapons aid provided to Ukraine by $3 billion “extremely problematic, to say the least.”
Reps. Mike Rogers (R-Ala.) and Michael McCaul (R-Texas), chairs of the House Armed Services and Foreign Affairs Committees, respectively, called on the Biden administration to use these extra funds to provide advanced munitions in support of Ukraine’s planned offensive operation.
“The revelation of a three-billion-dollar accounting error discovered two months ago and only today shared with Congress is extremely problematic, to say the least. These funds could have been used for extra supplies and weapons for the upcoming counteroffensive, instead of rationing funds to last for the remainder of the fiscal year. The Biden Administration must make up for this precious lost time by using these funds to provide Ukraine the DPICMS [cluster munitions] and ATACMS [long-range missiles] they need to fuel the counteroffensive and win the war,” Rogers and McCaul said in a joint statement.
Rogers and McCaul’s comments were in response to a Reuters report that detailed the Pentagon’s discovery that it overvalued the amount of security assistance provided to Ukraine by $3 billion.
The additional funds would allow the Pentagon to put together new security assistance packages for Ukraine in the near-term before the Biden administration would need to request further supplemental spending legislation to support continued support efforts.