Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said Sunday that “millions will be killed” in his country’s war with Russia without additional funding from the United States.
CNN’s Kaitlan Collins asked Zelensky in an interview to respond to comments made by Sen. JD Vance (R-Ohio), who claimed Ukraine’s outcome in its war will not be changed even if it receives the President Biden’s $60 billion aid request. Zelensky said he wasn’t sure if Vance “understands what is going on here.”
“To understand it is to come to the front line to see what’s going on, to speak with the people, then to go to civilians to understand … what will [happen to] them without this support. And he will understand that millions … will be killed. It’s a fact,” Zelensky said.
Because it’s not a “small” portion they WANT. That’s what’s known as a “beachhead”. Putin and the rest of the Duma have signaled that they want UKRAINE, in its totality, and preferably would not like those people with their ideas of “independence from Russia” in their heads - hence Putin actually saying the only victory he would accept is the destruction of Ukrainian identity as a concept (war against a concept doesn’t end well - see “war on terror/war on drugs”.) This is also ignoring the fact that Russia ALREADY tried the “storm in, kill the head of state, annex the country” bit with Georgia back in 2008, and got their shit kicked in by the Georgian military. Expansionist powers like Russia don’t just stop with whatever country they’re currently invading - there’s always another “over there” to go conquer.
If you want more evidence on this, I highly recommend you read up on a little thing called Imperial Japan, or potentially just Manifest Destiny. There’s never such a thing as “enough” for a state hellbent on expanding at all costs into territory they think is rightfully “theirs”.