“Inevitable”: NATO prepares to send troop trainers to Ukraine

Brussels: NATO allies are getting closer to sending troops to Ukraine to train Ukrainian forces, a move that would blur a previous red line and could drag the United States and Europe more directly into the war.

Ukraine’s manpower shortage has reached a critical point, and its battlefield position in recent weeks has seriously worsened as Russia has accelerated its advances to take advantage of delays in American weapons shipments. As a result, Ukrainian officials have asked their American and NATO counterparts to help train 150,000 recruits closer to the front lines for faster deployment.

So far, the United States has said no, but Gen. Charles Brown Jr, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said Thursday that the deployment of NATO trainers seemed inevitable. “We will get there eventually, in time,” he said.

For now, he said, an effort inside Ukraine would put “a group of NATO trainers at risk” and would most likely mean deciding whether to use valuable air defenses to protect the trainers instead of critical Ukrainian infrastructure near the battlefield. . Brown briefed reporters on his plane en route to a NATO meeting in Brussels.