{"id":16915,"date":"2023-06-28T20:59:52","date_gmt":"2023-06-28T20:59:52","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/?p=16915"},"modified":"2023-06-29T06:42:00","modified_gmt":"2023-06-29T06:42:00","slug":"u-s-german-defense-officials-pledge-continued-support-for-ukraine","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/?p=16915","title":{"rendered":"U.S., German Defense Officials Pledge Continued Support for Ukraine"},"content":{"rendered":"<div><\/div>\n<p>\n    Secretary of Defense Lloyd J. Austin III and German Defense Minister Boris Pistorius pledged today to continue their close partnership in supporting Ukraine and defending their countries&#8217; shared values.\n<\/p>\n<p><!--popup--><\/p>\n<p>The two leaders met at the Pentagon during Pistorius&#8217; first official visit to Washington as defense minister. \u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Austin noted that the Pentagon meeting marked his counterpart&#8217;s first official visit to the U.S., remarking that he and Pistorius have seen a lot of each other lately \u2014\u00a0including at recent meetings of the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nato.int\/\" target=\"_blank\">NATO<\/a> defense ministers and the Ukraine Defense Contact Group.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;And that&#8217;s especially important during this dangerous time for European and global security,&#8221; Austin said. &#8220;Russia has launched a cruel and unprovoked invasion of its peaceful neighbor, Ukraine. But Germany has committed itself to supporting &#8230; Ukraine&#8217;s sovereignty and its right to live in freedom.&#8221;\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>The U.S. has pledged to stand with Ukraine for as long as necessary to defend against Russia.<\/p>\n<p>Toward that end, the Biden administration has committed more than $40.5 billion in security assistance to Ukraine since Russia&#8217;s invasion began in February 2022. The U.S. also leads an alliance of more than 50 countries in rallying behind Ukraine through the contact group.<\/p>\n<p><!--popup--><\/p>\n<p>Austin praised Germany for its contributions to Ukraine&#8217;s defense forces. \u00a0<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;As Russia continues to direct this war of choice, I appreciate everything that Germany has done to strengthen Ukraine&#8217;s capability,&#8221; Austin said. &#8220;Your security assistance and training contributions for Ukraine&#8217;s defenders have been invaluable, and we must keep pushing hard to help Ukraine succeed.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Austin said Ukraine is at a &#8220;key moment&#8221; in its fight for sovereignty, and he welcomed discussion with Pistorius on how the U.S. and Germany can meet the urgent challenges ahead.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>In May, Germany announced 2.7 billion euros in military aid for Ukraine, including dozens of Leopard tanks, air defense systems and armored personnel carriers among other items.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Pistorius said that Germany, a country that once was on NATO&#8217;s eastern-most flank, has a &#8220;special responsibility&#8221; to continue to defend the alliance.<\/p>\n<p><!--popup--><\/p>\n<p>Beyond Ukraine, Austin said he looked forward to discussing &#8220;other key issues in our bilateral defense relationship and ways that we can do even more together.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>He also said that discussion would include ways the U.S. and Germany can work together to demonstrate their &#8220;shared commitment to a free and open Indo-Pacific.&#8221;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Secretary of Defense Lloyd J. Austin III and German Defense Minister Boris Pistorius pledged today to continue their close partnership in supporting Ukraine and defending their countries&#8217; shared values. The two leaders met at the Pentagon during Pistorius&#8217; first official visit to Washington as defense minister. \u00a0 Austin noted that the Pentagon meeting marked his [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":16917,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-16915","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16915","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/7"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=16915"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16915\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":16918,"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16915\/revisions\/16918"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/16917"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=16915"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=16915"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=16915"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}