The Risks of Arming Ukraine

As the U.S. spends billions on military aid, watchdogs warn of waste, corruption, and abuse and call for more oversight

- TOM O'CONNOR

A YEAR AFTER THE CHAOTIC U.S. AIRLIFT OUT of Kabul to escape the Taliban takeover and end a two-decade conflict in Afghanistan, the United States once again finds itself pouring billions of dollars in military and economic aid to a partner at war-this time to Ukraine, in its fight against Russia.

The U.S. has committed more than $13.5 billion in security assistance to Ukraine since President Joe Biden took office and, with the $40-billion dollar aid package that Congress passed in May still being doled out, more is forthcoming. If the Afghanistan experience is any guide, experts say, much of that money will be misdirected, misused, or lost altogether.

"We saw the same thing with Afghanistan when we poured a heck of a lot of money" into an effort to support the government there, says John Sopko, head of Office of the Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction (SIGAR), a congressionally-mandated agency that scrutinizes federal spending.

In 2020, SIGAR reported that about $19 billion out of about $63 billion in U.S. assistance to the Afghan government was lost to waste, corruption and abuse. (The total war effort cost $134 billion.)

Today, Sopko and other experts are warning that more oversight is necessary to avoid a similar fate regarding aid to Ukraine. "Anytime you throw that much money that fast into one country, you should have oversight baked in from the beginning," Sopko told Newsweek. "And I don't see that now. I see the regular oversight agencies stretched very thin."