President Biden revealed in an interview with CNN’s Fareed Zakaria that the US is low on 155mm artillery ammunition rounds and will be sending the cluster munitions to Ukraine during a “transition period” until more munitions are produced. Naturally, conservatives are angry with the president for his revealing comments.
Here’s what Biden said.
“This is a war relating to munitions. And they’re running out of that ammunition, and we’re low on it. And so, what I finally did, I took the recommendation of the Defense Department to – not permanently – but to allow for this transition period while we get more 155 weapons these shells for the Ukrainians.”
Reactions to Biden’s comment
As expected, conservatives rushed to malign Biden for being loose-lipped on CNN. Here is a sample of the reactions.
“Love when the president of America goes on CNN to tell everyone we’re low on ammo,” Logan Dobson tweeted.
“Joe Biden broadcasting to the world that the US is low on 155mm shells,” Steve Guest tweeted. “Moron. Does Biden not care that our adversaries in China are listening.”
“In CNN interview, President Biden is not particularly clear but seems to be saying US is sending cluster munitions to Ukraine because we are running out of 155mm artillery ammunition to send them,” Byron York of the Washington Examiner wrote. “Seems obvious this is affecting US readiness to defend itself.”
“Joe Biden wasn’t supposed to say the quiet part out loud: ‘We’ve run out of ammunition.’ But now that the cat’s out of the bag, one must ask whether continued support of Ukraine’s military is even feasible as the conflict rages on,” Ian Miles Cheong remarked.
“The point of the proxy war was to weaken Russia,” David Sachs tweeted. “But the US ran out of ammo first. So who’s weakening whom?”
Conservatives weren’t the only ones criticizing the comment. Democratic presidential candidate Robert Kennedy, Jr. derided the comments, albeit for different reasons.
“Last year, WH Press Secretary Jen Psaki called the use of cluster bombs a ‘war crime,’ Now President Biden plans to send them to Ukraine. Stop the ceaseless escalation! It is time for peace.” In a separate tweet, RFK continued, “Biden was opposed to cluster bombs in 1982 as well, when he opposed their sale to Israel. What happened to his conscience?”
White House Walk back
A White House official seems to have attempted to walk back Biden’s comments when asked to clarify.
“The military has specific requirements for the numbers of weapons systems and ammunition we maintain in our reserves in case of contingencies or military conflict,” the official said in an email to Fox News. “Everything we send to Ukraine is in excess of that. So, the US is not running out of ammunition ourselves”
The White House also emphasized that they did not want to leave Ukraine “defenseless.”
“We are authorizing cluster munitions to ensure that Ukraine is not left defenseless while we wait for or own domestic production of ammunition to ramp up substantially, which we are in the process of doing as are our allies and partners. The cluster munitions are a bridge as we significantly increase production of ammunition over the coming months – and will have much higher production levels soon.”
Harrison Kass is the Senior Editor and opinion writer at 19FortyFive. An attorney, pilot, guitarist, and minor pro hockey player, Harrison joined the US Air Force as a Pilot Trainee but was medically discharged. Harrison holds a BA from Lake Forest College, a JD from the University of Oregon, and an MA from New York University. Harrison listens to Dokken.
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