Senior defense and military officials from dozens of countries, including NATO members, will meet Friday at Ramstein Air Base in Germany. The decisions they make there will shape—and may determine—the course of Russia’s war of aggression against Ukraine in 2023 and beyond.
It’s clear that to achieve victory in Ukraine, Russia is willing to commit war crimes from the air and free criminals from prison to fight the hard battles on the ground. The West must not let this strategy succeed.
The Ukrainians have shown that they have the will to fight and endure privation to achieve victory. The task of the West—and in particular of the U.S., as leader of the West—is to ensure that they have the means to do so.
For months, Western countries have rebuffed urgent Ukrainian requests to send heavy tanks, such as the American M1 Abrams, the German Leopard and the British Challenger 2. Now the wall of resistance is crumbling. The British government has said that it will send 14 Challenger 2s to Ukraine, and the Poles have announced that they intend to send 14 Leopards—if Germany, which must authorize these transfers, consents.
But the real action is in Washington and Berlin. Last week
Laura Cooper,
a deputy assistant defense secretary, said that “we absolutely agree that Ukraine does need tanks.” Still, the U.S. has declined to provide the Abrams, citing fuel and maintenance issues. Published reports suggest that the U.S. has about 4,800 of these weapons, including more than 400 freed up by the Marine Corps’ decision to transform its war-fighting strategy. Surely we can spare some to help Ukraine break through Russian lines. It is hard to see a more important and urgent use for them.
A U.S. announcement that it will do so before the Ramstein meeting would remove Germany’s last excuse for not providing Leopard 2s to Ukraine, and the resignation on Monday of Germany’s hapless defense minister provides the perfect opportunity for a policy pivot. Last week Vice Chancellor
Robert Habeck
said that “Germany should not stand in…
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