France will still be Ukraine’s smallest European donor

Germany’s research laboratory on globalization issues, the Kiel Institute, has updated a new tool to track government aid to Ukraine, so it has the means to defend itself against aggression. Russian soldiers, February 24, 2022.

The EU gave 85 billion euros

A key lesson from the data published on Friday February 16, lies in the amount of aid allocated by the European Union, military, financial and humanitarian combined. That’s much more than the United States: 85 billion euros compared to 67.6 billion since the start of the war. However, European aid is mainly financial (77 billion), while the Americans allocate the largest share to the military (42.2 billion).

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Another lesson is not so glorious for France. With an estimated 1.7 billion euros in military aid, it is neck and neck with Italy in last place among European Union countries.

Some upset French people immediately reacted to the organization’s graphics, published on social networks. The data will not take into account the security agreement reached between Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and Frenchman Emmanuel Macron, no later than this Friday, February 16. Paris promised Up to three billion euros Additional military aid to 2024.

This is true, the Kill Team responded, pointing out on its site that its tool Ukraine support tracker Expires on January 15, 2024. On the other hand, researchers specify that the latter was designed to differentiate between leaders’ promises and actual aid. And they did the best they could with France’s lack of transparency in the matter. Unlike Washington or Berlin, Paris refuses to disclose details of its deliveries to Ukraine. The Kiel Institut ensures that it has carefully read the French parliamentary report of November 8, 2023.

According to figures provided by the French Ministry of Defense, the Kiel Institute apparently did not receive 3.2 billion euros. German analysts particularly contest estimates of the amount of French equipment sold at the cost of new equipment supposed to replace it. Basically, we value VAB (Armoured front vehicle, designed in 1970s) At the price of a griffon (Multi-role armored vehicle, put into service in 2022). It makes no sense that the Dutch, Norwegians and Danes valued their F-16 fighter jets at the same price as the F-35. Leo Peria-Paigne, a researcher at the French Institute of International Relations, explained to the newspaper Le Monde on January 31.

Paris has expressed his views on the issue several times, disputing Kiel’s reports. Its European partners, partly Germany and the more liberal alliance of Nordic countries, continue to believe that France, with the second-largest gross domestic product in the European Union (EU) and the most powerful army, should do more…