The Secretaries of Defense and State have recently taken to putting a military-industrial spin on their pleas to Congress for more Ukraine aid in an attempt to convince Republicans to support Biden’s bill. Austin announced that the armed forces have commenced “the most ambitious modernization effort in nearly 40 years for our defense industrial base” while Blinken boasted that “90% of the security assistance we’ve provided has actually been spent here in the United States with our manufacturers.”
This emerging narrative trend comes amidst the congressional deadlock over continuing to fund NATO’s proxy war on Russia through Ukraine after the latter’s summer counteroffensive failed, the latest Israeli-Hamas war redirected the US’ military focus, and political tensions started spiraling in Kiev. All three developments bode negatively for the scenario of this conflict becoming the US’ next “forever war” and instead strongly suggest that it’s finally beginning to wind down despite the endgame remaining unclear.
Nevertheless, elements within the US’ permanent policymaking bureaucracy still want to keep it going, which accounts for the feverishness with which the Biden Administration is pressuring the Republicans to approve more Ukraine aid. For their part, the opposition demanded robust border security reforms in exchange for their support, absent which they might let all aid run out so that the ruling party is forced to embarrassingly explain the indisputable loss of this proxy war to voters ahead of next year’s elections.
Either way, the Republicans are wagering that they’ll be able to achieve a political victory of some sort throughout the course of this debate that’ll increase the odds of them returning to power, which is why Austin and Blinken are now trying to appeal to their other interests in a last-ditch bid for support. By putting a military-industrial spin on their pleas, they’re hoping to play to some of these politicians’ misguided patriotism as well as what could even perhaps be their investments in that same industry.
Simply put, the Secretaries of Defense and State are hoping that they can convince enough Republicans to support the Democrats’ subjective interpretation of so-called “national interests” in this conflict and/or their own financial interests over their party’s ambitions to return to power next year. To their credit at the time of this piece’s publication, the opposition isn’t taking their bait, which can be interpreted as proof of how serious they are about holding firm on this pivotal issue.
Whatever investments they might have in the military-industrial complex aren’t as important to them as ensuring robust border security reform in exchange for their support on pain of finally forcing an end to this doomed-to-fail proxy war if this isn’t received. As for the misguided patriotic dimension of those leading officials’ emerging narrative trend, those investments should have been included the 2024 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), not as separate votes connected to Ukraine.
In fact, seeing as how the aforementioned legislation always increases in cost, those lawmakers that invest in the military-industrial complex are already profiting so the first part of the two Secretaries’ plea is solely trying to exploit their greed by dangling the carrot of even more profits than expected. Furthermore, the selfsame legislation already commits to large investments in the US’ defense industrial base, thus making the second part of their plea redundant and reaffirming its appeal to their greed.
The reality is that lawmakers will continue profiting from whatever investments they have in the military-industrial complex irrespective of whether Ukraine aid bill ever passes, whose uncertain future also won’t affect manufacturers, which are guaranteed business from the NDAA. Considering this, both parts of the emerging narrative trend that’s been embraced by the two Secretaries are misleading since they only appeal to misguided patriotism and greed, not legitimate national interests as claimed.
