Cheng Mo: The US aid to Ukraine bill was approved by the Senate, and the British military industry entered a wartime state
Original Cheng Mo Visionary 2024-04-24 13:53
Morning Mist / Repost
Executive summary: 1. The US Senate passed a package of foreign aid bills; 2. An important amendment to the US Army's tactical missiles; 3. British military enterprises were transferred to wartime production; 4. NATO Secretary General denied that nuclear weapons would be deployed in Poland; 5. Denmark allocated 420 million euros to help Ukraine rebuild; 6. The Russian Deputy Defense Minister in charge of logistics was arrested for taking bribes; 7. Ukraine continued to attack Russia's domestic energy facilities.
On the evening of April 23, local time (about 10:30 a.m. Beijing time today), the U.S. Senate passed a foreign aid bill worth $95 billion, as well as a bill requiring Chinese short video app TikTok to "ban if you don't sell it" from the Chinese company ByteDance. The four bills, which were originally voted separately in the House of Representatives, were consolidated into a single bill when they were sent to the Senate for a vote.
After several hours of debate, the Senate adopted a procedural vote by an overwhelming majority of 80 votes to 19 to put the bill to a vote and limit the time required for debate, and then adopted the final vote by a vote of 79 to 18. With the exception of one negative vote, the other negative votes were all from Republicans, all of whom were die-hard Trump supporters.
Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer said: This is a turning point in history. Western democracies may face the greatest threat since the end of the Cold War, and there is a need to put aside bipartisan differences and work together.
Senate Minority (Republican) Leader Mitch McConnell said that when Democrats entered the White House, Republicans tended to adopt an isolationist attitude, and more than half of Republican senators voted to advance the four bills passed by the House of Representatives a few days ago, siding with mainstream public opinion.
At this point, the world-renowned bill to aid Ukraine has completed the legislative process in the National Assembly, and the dust has finally settled. This proves that even with the emergence of extreme political figures like Trump, and the uncompromising political battles set off by Republican hardliners in major domestic and foreign policy decisions, resulting in extreme tears in American society, the rotten system of the United States, which is based on mainstream public opinion, still has a powerful error correction mechanism, which is the so-called corrupt and immortal.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky then posted on international social media to express his gratitude. "Thank you to Majority Leader Chuck Schumer and Republican Leader Mitch McConnell for their strong leadership in advancing this bipartisan legislation, as well as to all the bipartisan U.S. senators who voted in favor of the bill," he said. This vote strengthens America's role as a beacon of democracy and a leader of the free world. He also thanked all Americans who continue to support Ukraine and recognize that the historical significance of the bill transcends politics, as well as the strong support of U.S. President Joe Biden.
U.S. President Joe Biden also said at the first time, "I will sign this bill tomorrow as soon as it reaches my desk and address the American people." So that we can start sending weapons and equipment to Ukraine this week. He also said that the law passed by Congress is meant to strengthen national security and send a clear message to the world about American leadership.
(Exterior view of Capitol Hill, USA)
Today, on a well-known domestic portal, I saw a well-known media commenting on the "ban if you don't sell" TikTok bill passed by the United States, thinking that Trump can repeal this law when he takes office. This is actually a very layman's statement. When Trump comes to power, he may overturn the decisions of the previous U.S. administration, including previous presidential orders, but not laws that have already taken effect. In fact, the only judicial way to overturn a U.S. law is to sue the U.S. Supreme Court for the law to be unconstitutional. It seems that even some well-known media or well-known experts may not understand some basic legal knowledge in the United States.
According to a number of anonymous U.S. government officials told the media, a $1 billion military aid package is already being prepared for Ukraine.
Among the first lists of aid after the passage of the bill are Patriot anti-aircraft missiles, artillery shells, Hippocampus rockets, Bradley combat vehicles, and long-range army tactical missiles (ATACMS), which Ukraine urgently needs.
The bill passed this time clearly requires the US government to provide Ukraine with long-range army tactical missiles (ATACMS). Today I want to make an important correction: I mentioned in my article that the warhead of ATACMS is a cluster bomb, which is especially suitable for striking at troop and equipment concentration places and transportation hubs, and cannot destroy large bridge piers and fortified buildings.
Below are the various models of the Army Tactical Missile (ATACMS), and the next three models with a range of 300 km are all missiles with a single warhead. These three types of missiles can be used to destroy the Crimean bridge. However, it is now uncertain whether the US government will supply Ukraine with army tactical missiles with a single warhead. I judge that the United States will not provide Ukraine with single-warhead missiles that can destroy the Crimean bridge for the time being.
(U.S. Army Tactical Missile Models)
British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak and NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg visited Poland together on April 23, and at a joint press conference after the meeting, Sunak said that the UK plans to increase defense spending to 2.5% and that the British defense industry has moved to a state of war.
According to Sunak, the UK government plans to increase defence spending from £64.6bn in 2024 to £78.2bn in 2028 before jumping to £87bn in 2030. In addition to this, the UK will increase its defense spending by an additional £75 billion over the next six years and make the UK the second military power after the US among NATO members.
Yesterday, a number of attentive readers asked why there are so many missiles and combat vehicles in the latest 500 million pounds (about 620 million US dollars) of aid to Ukraine announced by the United Kingdom?
I understand that some of the anti-aircraft missiles are relatively cheap individual anti-aircraft missiles, not all of them are expensive medium and long-range missiles, and whether it is missiles, combat vehicles, or other weapons and ammunition, the United Kingdom, like the United States, in order to provide Ukraine with more weapons and ammunition, most of them are extracted from the original inventory, and the inventory is depreciated.
NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg said on the same day that NATO is developing a long-term financial support plan for Ukraine. He also revealed that NATO member states are providing Ukraine with more air defense systems.
Regarding Polish President Duda's recent statement that Poland is ready to accept NATO allies to deploy nuclear weapons on Polish territory, NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg said that NATO has no plans to deploy more nuclear weapons in other countries.
Recently there has been a lot of media hype about the deployment of NATO nuclear weapons in Poland, and I don't think there is any possibility. The basic strategy of the Western camp in the Russian-Ukrainian war is to "boil frogs in warm water and stew geese over slow fire" that I often mention, so as to avoid provoking Russia too much and triggering a nuclear war. With NATO already deploying a sufficient number of "triad" nuclear strike forces around Russia, it is impossible to provoke Russia by deploying nuclear weapons in Poland in such a move.
(U.S. Trinity Nuclear Strike Force)
On April 23, Yulia Sviridenko, First Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Economy of Ukraine, received the visiting Danish Minister of Entrepreneurship Morten Bozko, and the two sides signed a memorandum of cooperation. The Danish government has allocated 420 million euros to help Ukraine rebuild.
According to the memorandum signed by the two sides, the Danish government will allocate around 40 million euros to support the war-affected private sector in Ukraine and another 380 million euros to support critical infrastructure using renewable energy. Ukraine and Denmark will also strengthen cooperation in the field of shipbuilding, development of seaport infrastructure and reconstruction.
On April 23, local time, the Russian Investigative Committee reported that Russian Deputy Defense Minister Timur Ivanov was arrested on suspicion of accepting bribes. Russian presidential press secretary Dmitry Peskov said that Russian President Vladimir Putin has received a report on the situation, and Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu has also been informed of the arrest in advance.
Ivanov was appointed Deputy Minister of Defense of Russia in May 2016 and is responsible for the management of the Russian Armed Forces' property, garrison, housing and medical support. According to Russian state media, Ivanov could face up to 15 years in prison on suspicion of accepting bribes of at least 1 million rubles.
1,000,000 Russian rubles is equivalent to 77,700 yuan at the current official exchange rate. It is really too stingy for the Russian judiciary to arrest a deputy minister of defense who holds a lot of power for this small amount of money, and it is not as good as the cost of our businessmen to invite officials to eat, let alone Putin, who is rich and rival. People are really angry compared to people.
In the early hours of April 24, fuel and energy facilities in Russia's Smolensk region were attacked by Ukrainian drones, triggering multiple fires. Smolensk is separated from Ukraine by a Bryansk oblast, which is more than 300 kilometers away from Ukraine in a straight line, and is an area frequented by Ukrainian drones.
By the way, many recent social media mentions that the US government urged Ukraine not to attack Russian energy facilities, so as not to provoke an increase in international energy prices. Once again, I clarify, this is an outright lie. It can be expected that with the continuous improvement of Ukraine's long-range drone technology, Ukraine's attacks on Russia's domestic energy facilities will continue unabated.
On the 791st day of the outbreak of the Russian-Ukrainian war, the Ukrainian General Staff announced that the battle losses of the Russian army (including Russian locals, enterprises, and separatist groups) in the past 24 hours were as follows: 880 Russian troops were annihilated (dead and seriously wounded), and a total of 461,900 Russian troops were annihilated; Destroyed 1 tank, 12 armored vehicles, 2 air defense systems, 2 rocket launch systems, 47 fuel tankers and logistics heavy-duty vehicles, 8 sets of special equipment (mainly electronic warfare equipment), 43 artillery pieces, and intercepted 32 suicide drones.
(The battle losses of the Russian army counted by the Ukrainian side on April 24)
Based on various information, I roughly estimate that the losses of Ukrainian officers and soldiers are about 95,000, of which the number of dead and seriously injured is also 1:1, and more than 20,000 Ukrainian civilians have been killed. The warriors of Ukraine who died defending their homeland will return to heaven with glory and be with God.
Let us continue to pray that God will give peace and put an end to wars, that the wicked may be rewarded and the good be sheltered.
Information source: 2024-04-24 WeChat official account Vision
ID:yjzd-303
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