Zelensky warns of guerrilla war as Ukraine aid stalls in Congress

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky told Congress on Tuesday that his country will never give up in its fight to expel invading Russian forces, but he warned that without additional U.S. assistance, the conflict will turn far more brutal as his military inevitably cedes ground to its determined and well-armed adversary.

Zelensky has come to Washington as Ukraine, low on weaponry and cash, faces a stalemate in the war with Russia and growing resistance among some Republican lawmakers to President Biden’s request for billions of dollars in U.S. aid. This is his second visit to the United States in the past three months, as negotiations have stalled on Capitol Hill.

The Ukrainian leader met first with members of the Senate. As lawmakers emerged from the private discussion, Sens. Lindsey O. Graham (R-S.C.) and Ron Johnson (R-Wis.) told reporters that Zelensky had invoked the term “guerrilla warfare,” alluding to the bloody, unconventional tactics employed by insurgents against occupying U.S. forces in Afghanistan and Iraq.

“I have no doubt Ukrainians will fight to the last person,” Graham said.

Zelensky was to meet next with House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.), before heading to the White House for an afternoon strategy session with President Biden.

The mission, which comes just a week before lawmakers are expected to leave town for the holidays, is critical, said one of Zelensky’s senior aides: Ukraine’s military needs help now. “It’s a matter of life and death for Ukraine,” said the senior adviser, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss conversations with senior American officials. “Time is of the essence: That’s the message.”

To date, Congress has allocated more than $111 billion to support Ukraine, but lawmakers have so far failed to heed Biden’s request earlier this fall for an additional $61 billion for the year ahead, part of a larger emergency spending request that would also provide security assistance to Israel, Taiwan and the U.S. border.

Public support for Ukraine has fallen steadily in recent months, and Republican lawmakers - particularly in the House of Representatives, where the party’s right flank has wielded outsize influence - have expressed a rapidly diminishing appetite for funding Ukraine’s war effort.

A growing number of Republicans in both chambers have said in recent weeks that they will not approve Ukraine aid unless it comes with a major tightening of U.S. immigration policy.

Zelensky was scheduled last week to virtually address a House and Senate briefing on Ukraine, but the Ukrainian leader canceled that appearance shortly before the briefing devolved into a shouting match over U.S. border policy. Several Republican lawmakers left partway through.

“My advice to the White House would be, the President made a commitment to Zelensky. To honor that commitment, they’re going to need to secure the border,” Sen. Mitt Romney (R-Utah) told reporters Monday. “If I were the president, I would twist every Democrat arm and maybe some Republican arms, and say, ‘Get the job done.’”

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), long one of the most vocal Republican supporters of Ukraine, has also joined his conference in demanding immigration changes to support the supplemental funding package.

“When it comes to keeping America safe, border security is not a sideshow,” McConnell said on Monday. “It’s ground zero. Senate Republicans have no more spare time to explain this basic reality.”

Biden signaled last week he would be willing to accept significant immigration restrictions to get a deal, but negotiations between the two parties have so far failed to produce one, and lawmakers have just a few more days to get it done before their holiday recess - a goal that one of the deal’s top negotiators said they would not meet.

Zelensky, meanwhile, on Monday warned an audience of U.S. and international military personnel gathered at the National Defense University in Washington that his nation’s chances at victory hang in the balance.

“When the free world hesitates,” Zelensky said, “that’s when dictators celebrate … If there’s anyone inspired by unresolved issues on Capitol Hill, it is just [Russian President Vladimir] Putin and his sick clique.”

“It’s crucial that politics don’t even try to betray the soldier,” Zelensky added later in his speech. “Just like weapons are needed for their defense, freedom always requires unity.”

The U.S. intelligence community believes that Russia has lost about 87 percent of the forces and 63 percent of the tanks it had at the outset of the invasion in February 2022, said a person familiar with the assessment that was declassified at the request of Congress. The Ukraine war has set back by 15 years Moscow’s ability to modernize its ground forces, the person said. The loss of so many tanks - some 2,200 by U.S. estimates - has forced the Russians to draw on old Soviet stocks, increasingly deploying 1970s-era models, the person said.

Adrienne Watson, a spokesperson for the National Security Council, said Tuesday that, in the past few months alone, Russia’s military has lost more than 13,000 troops and more than 220 combat vehicles along its offensive lines. The Kremlin, she said, “seems to believe that a military deadlock through the winter will drain Western support for Ukraine and ultimately give Russia the advantage despite Russian losses and persistent shortages of trained personnel, munitions, and equipment.”

The Biden administration last week announced $175 million in additional security assistance to Ukraine, but it cautioned that without congressional approval, that would be some of the last aid it could provide.

Both the administration and Zelensky’s government have warned that Kyiv could lose its ability to pay government workers, including first responders, without further aid. One Ukrainian lawmaker said last week that U.S. support so far in the war has constituted roughly a third of the country’s budget.

Throughout his speech on Monday, Zelensky invoked the spread of democratic ideals and prosperity, and sought to position his country as a bulwark against Putin’s expansionist desires in Europe.

“You can count on Ukraine. And we hope just as much to be able to count on you,” he said.