By Jeff Louderback
Presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. this week reiterated his objection to U.S. involvement in the Russia–Ukraine war, criticizing American defense contractors who met with Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskyy in Washington.
“I was surprised that they did it so openly,” Mr. Kennedy told The Epoch Times after a Dec. 13 voter rally in Kansas City. “The optics of it are very, very bad. The grift is right in our faces. No one bothers to conceal who the real stakeholders are in the Ukraine war.”
During the rally, Mr. Kennedy told supporters that the conflict is “a proxy war between the U.S. and Russia” and U.S. funding of Ukraine is a “money-laundering scheme” that takes wealth out of taxpayer pockets and puts it “into the coffers” of companies like Boeing, Raytheon, and Lockheed-Martin.
Mr. Zelenskyy visited Washington for a third time on Dec. 12 and implored lawmakers to support authorization for additional arms.
He conferred with President Joe Biden, Vice President Kamala Harris, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.), Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), and House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) among other elected officials.
Before that meeting, Mr. Zelenskyy huddled with 10 executives from the defense industry. These are companies that make weapons and benefit financially from the funds that Congress has approved for the conflict, Mr. Kennedy said.
Mr. Zelenskyy praised the defense contractor representatives and said, “Without such people, companies, and such workers, we really couldn’t manage and save our land. We are thankful that we have such friends.”
During his meeting with President Biden at the White House, Mr. Zelenskyy thanked the “really powerful companies” that he entertained.
According to the Ukrainian president’s office, attendees included AeroVironment Vice President Charles Dean, BAE Systems President Tom Arseneault, Boeing President Theodore Colbert, Day & Zimmermann Chair and CEO Harold Yoh, D&M Holding CEO Daniel Powers, General Dynamics Vice President Mark Roualet, Lockheed Martin Vice President Raymond Piselli, Northrop Grumman Vice President Stephen O’Bryan, RTX Vice President Jeff Shockey, and Sierra Nevada Corp. CEO Fatih Ozmen.
Mr. Zelenskyy will “invite American partners to take a stake in Ukrainian defense companies, which would be in the interests of all parties involved,” according to his office.
During the meeting, Mr. Zelenskyy proposed a Ukraine-based defense hub for Europe.
Weapons Funding
Mr. Kennedy noted that Mr. McConnell said earlier this year that U.S. funding for Ukraine “doesn’t actually go to Ukraine” but “gets invested in American defense manufacturing.”
“It funds new weapons and munitions for the U.S. armed forces to replace the older material we have provided to Ukraine,” Mr. McConnell said in a June 2023 press release.
Mr. McConnell’s statement, and Mr. Zelenskyy’s meeting with American defense contractors, is further indication that “we are living in the military-industrial complex that President Dwight D. Eisenhower warned us about,” Mr. Kennedy said at a press conference after the rally.
Mr. Kennedy also commented on X after Mr. Zelenskyy’s summit with the defense contractors.
“If it were really a humanitarian defensive war on behalf of the Ukrainian people, would we have sent Boris Johnson to scuttle a tentative peace agreement between Zelensky and Putin back in April 2022?” Mr. Kennedy wrote.
White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said that President Biden’s White House invitation to Mr. Zelenskyy was “to underscore the United States’ unshakeable commitment to supporting the people of Ukraine as they defend themselves against Russia’s brutal invasion.”
Mr. Kennedy responded on X by writing, “Pure propaganda from [Ms. Jean-Pierre]. Would love for our elected officials to have an ‘unshakable commitment’ to homefront issues we are all dealing with right now. Instead, they’re rolling out the red carpet again for Zelensky.”
America’s Role
Since announcing his candidacy in April to challenge President Biden, the Democrat-turned-Independent candidate has called for peace negotiations to end the war in Ukraine and has repeatedly chastised the Biden administration for continuing to fund Ukraine.
He says he’s sympathetic to the Ukrainian cause and that Russian President Vladimir Putin invaded the country illegally, but he has chastised the United States for its role in the conflict.
“We have neglected many, many opportunities to settle this war peacefully,” he said. “We have turned that nation into a proxy war between Russia and the United States.”
Mr. Kennedy has urged President Biden to negotiate a peaceful end to the Russia–Ukraine war, which started when Russia invaded its neighbor in February 2022.
“Russia is not going to lose this war. Russia can’t afford it,” he said. “It would be like us losing a war to Mexico.”
The Senate had been scheduled to adjourn for the holidays on Dec. 15, but Mr. Schumer announced on Dec. 14 that he and his colleagues will return to work next week in hopes of reaching an agreement on border policy measures that have been tied to a bill to authorize additional arms and ammunition for Ukraine before Christmas.
The Senate will vote on supplemental aid for Ukraine and Israel next week “no matter what,” Mr. Schumer added.
The additional military aid for Ukraine is part of a $106 billion supplemental funding package requested by President Biden that includes $45 billion in military aid for Ukraine, $14.3 billion for Israel, $13.6 billion for U.S. border security, and $10 billion for humanitarian aid for Israel, Ukraine, Gaza, and refugees entering the United States.
At a White House press conference with Mr. Zelenskyy on Dec. 12, President Joe Biden said: “We’re in negotiations to get funding we need. Not making promises, but hopeful we can get there—I think we can,” minutes after he said that the United States would keep supplying Ukraine with air defenses, artillery, and other weapons “as long as we can.”
President Biden at the press conference also announced another military assistance package of $200 million for Ukraine, pulling from funds previously authorized by Congress.
Mr. Kennedy believes decades of U.S. and NATO policy toward Ukraine and Russia created conditions for the war.
Russia has “legitimate security concerns” about moving NATO into Ukraine, he said.
“We would never let them put missile systems in Canada or Mexico, we would invade if they did.”
Earlier this year, he said that Mr. Zelenskyy could have prevented the invasion by just saying five words: “I will not join NATO.”
Asked about NATO this week, President Biden said, “NATO will be in Ukraine’s future, no question about that.”
According to NATO’s Article 5, an attack against one member is considered an attack on all.
At a year-end news conference on Dec. 14, President Putin said there would be no peace in Ukraine until the Kremlin achieves its goals, which remain unchanged after nearly two years of fighting.
“There will be peace when we will achieve our goals,” Mr. Putin said, repeating a frequent Kremlin line. “Victory will be ours.”
Russia’s stated goals in Ukraine—which include “de-Nazification, de-militarization, and a neutral status” of Ukraine—remain unchanged from the day Mr. Putin sent troops into the neighboring country in February 2022.
Mr. Putin insisted that Ukraine remain neutral and refrain from joining NATO.
Mr. Kennedy said that Mr. Putin has twice agreed to peace accords.
“He agreed to the Minsk Accord, and then he agreed in 2022 to an agreement that would’ve left Ukraine completely intact.”
“I abhor Russia’s brutal and bloody invasion of that nation. But we must understand that our government has also contributed to its circumstances through repeated deliberate provocations of Russia going back to the 1990s.”
