The United States announced $3 billion dollars in military assistance for Ukraine on Friday, which the White House said was the largest aid package for Kyiv to date.
Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said the as-sistance, which will be detailed later by the Pentagon, is expected to include Bradley infantry fighting vehicles, MRAPs and other personnel carriers, and self-propelled howitzers.
Washington and Berlin announced the previous day that they would provide armoured vehicles — Bradleys from the United States and Marders from Germany — but did not provide details on numbers.
Bradleys, which are usually armed with a 25mm autocannon, a 7.62mm machine gun and anti-tank missiles, will provide Ukrainian forces with addi-tional firepower.
“It’s not a tank, but it’s a tank killer,” Pentagon spokesman Brigadier General Pat Ryder said Thurs-day.
“We’re confident that it will aid them on the bat-tlefield,” he added. It should be noted that on a pre-vious day, Russia ordered a ceasefire amid Orthodox Christmas eve which was urged by Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and Russia’s spiritual leader Patriarch Kirill, a staunch Putin supporter.
However, that ceasefire was rejected by Ukraine calling it ‘ ‘hypocrisy’, adding that “Russia wants to use truce as cover to stop our advances in Donbas and bring in more equipment.”—AFP
