The Anzac spirit – especially the resonance of mateship, endurance and courage – settled over the United States Congress this week. Anzac is a powerful export.
Finally, Congress has passed the bill which releases desperately needed aid for Ukraine. How close has Ukraine been to defeat? Volodymyr Zelensky told PBS last week, “I can tell you, frankly, without this support, we will have no chance of winning”. He just got 60 billion new reasons to keep fighting – and to start pushing the Russians back.
US President Joe Biden at the White House on Tuesday.Credit: AP
Republican Michael McCaul, chair of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, said it plainly: “We cannot be afraid of this moment. We have to do what’s right. Evil is on the march. History is calling and now is the time to act. History will judge us by our actions here today. As we deliberate on this vote, you have to ask yourself this question: Am I Chamberlain or Churchill?”
It took the Republicans a long time to get it. In the seven months since President Joe Biden asked Congress to keep the faith and defeat the Russians in Ukraine, Donald Trump rose, once again, to completely dominate the Republican Party. Trump eviscerated all his competitors, and acted as president-in-waiting by dictating terms to Republicans in Congress on what they should do on his key hot button issues, especially immigration and Ukraine.
Indeed, what Trump presents is the end of American world leadership – as defined by Ronald Reagan four decades ago – and its replacement with an isolationist “America First” pose. Trump has gone to great lengths to help Russia’s Vladimir Putin challenge NATO.
Although the vote in the House was overwhelming for the aid to Ukraine, a majority of Republicans – 112 – voted against it. In the Senate, there was significantly more Republican support.
Speaker of the House Mike Johnson after lawmakers approved a bill to authorise $US95 billion in aid for Ukraine, Israel and other allies.Credit: AP
The key was Mike Johnson, the House Speaker, who knows Trump can get him ousted just as he did with several Republicans who crossed the former president. Johnson, a fundamentalist conservative, finally found, like the Lion in The Wizard of Oz, his courage to do the right thing. “Three of our primary adversaries – Russia, Iran and China – are working together, and they are aggressors around the globe,” Johnson said after the vote. “They’re a global threat to our prosperity and our security.”
Johnson is dead right about Iran. But this military aid package was surprisingly assisted by the Islamic republic. For months after the October 7 attack on Israel, the House of Representatives was paralysed on the military funding package. Iran’s massive April 14 missile attack on Israel —a true game-changer of a threat to Israel and the West – provided last-minute impetus to break the deadlock in Congress.
Joe Biden just had a significant win, but he’s still in the wars
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24.04.2024
The Anzac spirit – especially the resonance of mateship, endurance and courage – settled over the United States Congress this week. Anzac is a powerful export.
Finally, Congress has passed the bill which releases desperately needed aid for Ukraine. How close has Ukraine been to defeat? Volodymyr Zelensky told PBS last week, “I can tell you, frankly, without this support, we will have no chance of winning”. He just got 60 billion new reasons to keep fighting – and to start pushing the Russians back.
US President Joe Biden at the White House on Tuesday.Credit: AP
Republican Michael McCaul, chair of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, said it plainly: “We cannot be afraid of this moment. We have to do........
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