Mark Hertling, a former commanding general in the U.S. Army who spent decades in military service before his retirement, spoke out this week to criticize the voices in Congress trying to distance the U.S. from Ukraine amid that country’s work to defend itself from Putin’s violence.
“There’s a concerted effort by some in congress to erode support for Ukraine,” Hertling said. “By doing so, those individuals show they don’t understand shared security among democratic nations & the values we say the US supports. They are also, in effect, supporting imperialism & war crimes.” Hertling’s comments could very easily apply to, among others, Reps. Matt Gaetz (R-Fla.) and Lauren Boebert (R-Colo.), both of whom were among those attaching their names to a proposed resolution in the House that, if passed, would formally push back on the prospect of further U.S. help for the Ukrainian government, falsely tying that support, which has taken the form of, among other things, an array of weapons, to deaths of civilians.
The Ukrainian soldiers using weapons provided by the U.S. aren’t the ones responsible for keeping the war going. If Russian forces withdrew from Ukraine right now, the war would be over — and the help the U.S. provided could be more credibly argued to have helped keep civilian deaths lower, since the equipment has provided for a more robust defense. Besides Gaetz, that resolution garnered ten cosponsors, also including Reps. Paul Gosar (R-Ariz.), Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.), Andy Biggs (R-Ariz.), and other perceptible loudmouths. “It is the sense of the House of Representatives that the United States must end its military and financial aid to Ukraine,” the resolution said.
Others trying to push back on support for Ukraine include Donald Trump and Ron DeSantis, the latter of whom — currently the governor of Florida — recently dismissively referred to the war in Ukraine as a “territorial dispute” and questioned U.S. support. The conflict is a war of aggression in which Russian forces have decimated vast areas inside Ukraine, put people across that country under consistent threats of airstrikes, and in areas like the southern city of Mariupol killed what reports suggest are tens of thousands of civilians in sustained assaults.
There’s a concerted effort by some in congress to erode support for Ukraine.
By doing so, those individuals show they don’t understand shared security among democratic nations & the values we say the US supports.
They are also, in effect, supporting imperialism & war crimes.
— MarkHertling (@MarkHertling) March 17, 2023
