President biden’s foreign policy doctrine and advancing U.S. assistance to Ukraine

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President Biden's foreign policy doctrine and advancing U.S. assistance to Ukraine

Iryna Dudko, Doctor of Political Sciences, Professor, Educational and Scientific Institute of Public Administration and Civil Service of Taras Shevchenko National University of Kyiv; Vladyslav Faraponov, Analyst at Internews Ukraine

Abstract

The purpose of this article is to analyze the United States' support to Ukraine during the war with Russia, as well as in the months leading up to Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. This issue remains relevant to conceptualizing US assistance to Ukraine to expel Russian forces from its territory. In particular, we claim that among other policy alternatives, the Biden administration deliberately chose to support Ukraine «for as long as it takes». Thus, we analyze the amount and comprehensiveness of support to Ukraine, which we consider to be in Washington's core interests, as well as US efforts in terms of policy-making.

The methodological design of the study is based on discourse analysis as a major method, which allowed us to examine the policy choice of the Biden administration to provide massive and comprehensive support to Ukraine in a critical time of need. When describing US assistance, we apply historical institutionalism and rational choice institutionalism as the major theoretical paradigms, as there are features of both used by the United States in its bilateral relations with Ukraine. We operate within a confirmatory research design, where the major method is hypothesis testing. The scientific novelty consists of an attempt to conceptualize the so-called Biden doctrine in the context of American assistance to Ukraine in order to sustain it in the war against Russia. We test our hypothesis on three major dimensions: the President's authority, Congress and the U.S. leadership of NATO, and the Defense Contact Group.

The authors conclude that the amount of US support to Ukraine and its comprehensiveness, particularly economic and military aid, indicate that the Biden administration viewed Ukraine as a test of its vision of foreign policy, namely that democracies should prevail over autocracies. Therefore, the unprecedented amount of aid allocated to Ukraine suggests that the support will last as long as it takes.

Key words: United States, American-Ukrainian relations, American foreign policy, U.S. assistance for Ukraine, Joe Biden's doctrine.

Анотація

Доктрина зовнішньої політики президента Байдена та збільшення підтримки України

Ірина Дудко, доктор політичних наук, професор, Навчально-науковий інститут публічного управління та державної служби, Київський національний університет імені Тараса Шевченка, Владислав Фарапонов, аналітик ГО «Інтерньюз-Україна»

Стаття присвячена аналізу підтримки Сполученими Штатами України під час повномасштабної війни з РФ, а також за кілька місяців до повномасштабного вторгнення РФ в Україну в лютому 2022 року. Це питання залишається актуальним для концептуалізації допомоги США, аби Україна змогла вигнати російські війська зі своєї території. Зокрема, ми стверджуємо, що серед інших політичних альтернатив адміністрація Байдена свідомо вибрала підтримку України «стільки, скільки буде потрібно». Таким чином, ми аналізуємо обсяги та всеохопність підтримки України, яка, на нашу думку, відповідає ключовим інтересам Вашингтона, а також аналізуємо зусилля США у контексті формування власної політики.

Методологічний дизайн статті базується на дискурс-аналізі. Даний метод дозволив нам проаналізувати підтримку України з боку адміністрації Байдена у критично складний час. Аналізуючи допомогу США, ми застосовуємо історичний інституціоналізм та інституціоналізм раціонального вибору у вигляді основних теоретичних парадигм, оскільки Сполучені Штати в двосторонніх відносинах з Україною демонструють наявність обох із них. Ми працюємо в рамках підтверджувального дизайну дослідження, де основним методом є перевірка гіпотез.

Наукова новизна статті полягає в спробі концептуалізації так званої доктрини Байдена в контексті американської допомоги Україні, що має на меті підтримку у війні проти РФ. Ми перевіряємо нашу гіпотезу за трьома основними параметрами: повноваженнями Президента, Конгресу та лідируючий позиції США в НАТО та у рамках Контактної групи з питань оборони України.

Ми приходимо до висновків, що обсяг та всеохопність американської допомоги, зокрема економічної та безпекової, свідчить про те, що Адміністрація Байдена розглядає підтримку України як один з засобів тестування свого бачення зовнішньої політики. Зокрема, йдеться про те, що демократії повинні перемогти автократії. Таким чином, безпрецедентна допомога Україні демонструє те, що підтримка буде посилюватись та тривати стільки, скільки буде потрібно.

Ключові слова: США, американсько-українські відносини, зовнішня політика США, допомога США Україні, доктрина Джо Байдена.

«We chose liberty. We chose sovereignty. We stood with Ukraine». September 21, 2022, US President Joe Biden's remarks before the 77th Session of the United Nations General Assembly

Problem statement

More than a year into Russia's full-scale war against Ukraine, the United States of America has proved that it is still the leading country in the world and is a true ally of Ukraine. Washington has proved its commitment to Ukraine as a strategic ally but has also become the largest donor of military and financial aid that helps Ukraine keep fighting on the battlefield and ensuring proper governance, and maintaining economic stability in the country. There is a growing concern, particularly in the U.S., about how fast and on which terms the Russia-Ukraine war ends and whether the U.S. should keep up its assistance to Ukraine. Existing literature does not provide a Ukrainian-American perspective on the issue in retrospect, given the timeline of the issue and the recent developments of U.S.-Ukraine cooperation to address war-related challenges. Therefore, the research question is: Is support for Ukraine aligned with the Biden foreign policy doctrine?

Analysis of Research and Publications

Since the issue of American assistance to Ukraine in the face of large-scale aggression is dealt with in the current state of modern international relations, its consideration is at the initial research stage and is mainly of journalistic character. However, historiography offers a significant basis of scientific understanding of the problem, which reflects the general trends in the development of U.S.-Ukrainian relations in the post-bipolar world and makes it possible to form fundamental approaches to understanding the essence of American assistance to Ukraine, as well as to outline the prospects for its development. The work is based on current materials that characterize US assistance to Ukraine, government documents of the United States, and statements and reports of public officials. Publications of periodicals, analysts and experts on the problem under consideration are also used.

Novelty of Research

This article attempts to provide a comprehensive but still- limited perspective on the Biden administration's foreign policy doctrine and its Ukrainian dimension. First, we conceptualize Biden's foreign policy doctrine and its applications to its policy on Ukraine. We argue that assisting Ukraine is the best option among other policy alternatives, which aligns with the United States' short and long-term interests in Europe and the world.

Primary purpose

The article aims to analyze American support to Ukraine during, but also several months prior to Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022. In particular, we claim that among other policy alternatives, the Biden administration deliberately chose to support Ukraine «for as long as it takes». Thus, we analyze these alternatives and examine American assistance to Kyiv, which we consider to be in Washington's core interests.

Research design and methods

As this is qualitative research, the major method is discourse analysis, which allowed us to examine the policy choice of the Biden administration to provide massive and comprehensive support to Ukraine in a critical time of need. When describing U.S. assistance, we apply historical institutionalism and rational choice institutionalism as the major theoretical paradigms, as there are features of both used by the United States in its bilateral relations with Ukraine. We operate within a confirmatory research design, where the major method is hypothesis testing.

Those paradigms help us consider U.S. aid to Ukraine in terms of political cooperation. Limitations within our research design should be perceived in several dimensions: first, the timeframe of the research ends on March 21, 2023, when the United States announced its latest package of aid to Ukraine, which ultimately does not allow it to take into account subsequent events or consider wider perspectives. Second, the holistic assessment is made by Ukrainian authors residing in Ukraine but based on English-language sources, primarily American ones, which helps us analyze the American perspective. Third, we analyze the Biden administration's foreign policy, although only two full years in office have passed. Fourth, this article neither compares military aid from the United States with aid from other countries nor provides an in-depth analysis of other aspects of Biden's foreign policy doctrine.

The main text of the article

The U.S. assistance to Ukraine in sustaining Russian aggression during the largest war in Europe since 1945 has attracted the attention of former and current officials, policymakers, and political scientists. More than a year into the conflict, some of them still argue that America «suddenly justified spending billions of dollars on Ukraine» - virtually making the US a co-belligerent in the war against Russia [18]. In contrast, other bipartisan claims make a case for vital American interests in supporting Ukraine. In particular, John Bolton states that it is in America's best interests to articulate its strategy toward Ukraine as a complete Ukraine victory and not to overestimate Russian capabilities [3]. There have been those who advocated for a Lend- Lease Program before it was approved [38]. At the same time, there have been notable calls on President Biden to speed up support to Ukraine, claiming it will send a clear signal to other autocratic leaders who may think about invading other countries [14]. However, the existing literature has almost not considered American assistance to Ukraine as a part of the so-called Biden doctrine.

Our hypothesis is that after the first months of Ukraine's fight to counter Russia's full-blown war, in particular, due to the successful counteroffensive of Ukraine's Armed Forces, the Biden administration realized that supporting Ukraine was not only in line with U.S. national security interests but that Ukraine's victory was reachable with American assistance, as Russia failed to achieve any of its strategic objectives in its brutal war. Therefore, US officials redefined their strategy and sufficiently increased the mass of American aid to Ukraine. That said, Ukraine's victory turned out to be one of the essential pillars of Biden's foreign policy doctrine.

We will test our hypothesis on several dimensions after conceptualizing foreign aid within the existing literature. First, we will examine the so-called presidential dimension, which involves the entire government, including the US Department of State and the Department of Defense. Second, we will analyze the Congressional dimension, applying bipartisan support to Ukraine in both houses of Congress. The third dimension will include US leadership within NATO and the so-called Ukraine Defense Contact Group, commonly referred to as «Ramstein». In all of these dimensions, we will consider both military and financial assistance to Ukraine, but not humanitarian assistance.

First, it is important to conceptualize American assistance. In this research, we do not create a new definition, as it has been set by the Foreign Assistance Act of 1961, which is the allocation of any tangible or intangible item from the U.S. government, including but not limited to training, service, technical advice in terms of gift, loan, credit, sale or guaranty [10]. Our argument is that all of the above is relevant to U.S.- Ukraine cooperation since 2014, and in particular, after February 2022. We will assess later in the article why the U.S. scheme of assistance hints at being comprehensive, which ultimately suggests that U.S. assistance is in line with national security interests. In order to explain how aid is administered, it is necessary to stress which general objectives can be defined from looking at U.S. history, as it can be argued that U.S. President Harry Truman's administration created the institution of international aid as it is known now. As noted by the Congressional Research Service, U.S. assistance aims to achieve several key objectives. They include the promotion of economic growth, reducing poverty, improving governance, expanding access to health care and education, promoting stability in conflict regions, countering terrorism, promoting human rights, strengthening allies, and curbing illicit drug production and trafficking. The primary rationale that impacts the general decision to allocate aid or not is still national security, alongside the commercial and humanitarian interests of America as a donor-state in this case. The commercial interests mainly touch upon how to promote U.S. exports, in particular by creating new customers for U.S. goods [11]. So, in the context of the Russia-Ukraine war, it could be assessed that the United States proved that national security and humanitarian interests prevail. The United States was only the 7th among Ukraine's top 10 import partners as of 2020, which could partially discard the trade dimension, as the trade dynamic between the two countries is already relatively high [34].

What is more, according to more recent history and U.S. support of Ukraine, such a line coincided with the concept of supporting new democracies by the American administrations after the collapse of the communist system and the formation of a new system of international relations in the post-bipolar world. The latter concerned Ukraine primarily, whose political leaders, having abandoned nuclear weapons, began to focus on active cooperation with Euro-Atlantic economic and military-political structures. To this should be added the associated membership of Ukraine in the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) - a status that was supposed to ensure its sovereignty as well as independence in the system of international relations. All this together became one of the grounds for the American establishment rethinking Ukrainian independence. Contrary to the expected subordination of Ukraine to Moscow's political course, it showed independence in its implementation of state policy. The year 1994, proclaimed by Bill Clinton as the year of Ukraine, can be considered a turning point in the direction of the US policy towards the Ukrainian state from maintaining neutrality or even exerting political pressure to significant political support.

Significant since the second half of the 1990s, American political discourse has formed a position about Ukraine as a possible barometer of democratic trends and stability in the post-Soviet space and, accordingly, the need to maintain its integrity. «For policymakers, the integrity of Ukraine is also of great importance,» stressed analyst W. Zimmerman in his time. «Were Ukraine to come unhinged, the significant possibility would arise of a civil war that would make the strife in the Caucasus and erstwhile Yugoslavia pale in comparison. Moreover, were some sizable fraction of Ukraine to unite with Russia, the strategic situation in the center of Europe would be fundamentally altered. The Soviet Union was unthinkable without Ukraine. A Russia that had absorbed Ukraine, or a large fraction thereof, would be thought by many elites in the postcommunist states of Central and Eastern Europe to represent a security threat quite similar to that of its Soviet predecessor» [44].

It correlates with Z. Brzezinski's previously-asserted conceptual thought that without Ukraine, the rebuilding of the Russian empire was out of the question. «It cannot be stressed enough that without Ukraine, Russia ceases to be an empire, but with Ukraine suborned and then subordinated, Russia automatically becomes an empire», - the researcher noted in his «Strategic Vision: America and the Crisis of Global Power» [5, p. 95].

The main idea of this approach is that Ukrainian independence has become a valuable guide to the United States' foreign policy as opposed to Russia's imperial encroachments and that America should provide political guarantees for the independence and territorial integrity of Ukraine [4]. It must also be added that analyzing Ukraine's position in the system of international relations since the beginning of the Russian aggression in 2014, a number of analysts began to consider this conflict as part of a broader geopolitical confrontation between Russia and the West. According to this point of view, Russia's aggression against Ukraine is not limited solely to the restoration of Russian imperial influences in the post-Soviet space but is focused on global processes with the restoration of Russia's status as a world geopolitical or «civilizational» center capable of influencing and changing the stable world order. Within the framework of this approach, Ukraine began to be considered as a sphere of collision between geopolitics and geoeconomics, according to Charap and Colton [7] or «critical geopolitics», according to Toal [32] of two poles based on opposite civilizational landmarks.

As it is noted by T. Kuzio and P. D'Anieri in this respect, «a final approach sees the conflict as an effort by the Russian government to reassert a particular notion of Russian national identity which sees Russia not as a nation-state but as a «civilization», that extends beyond the boundaries of the Russian Federation and is incompatible with an independent Ukraine» [19].

Thus, after the beginning of Russia's aggression in 2014, the U.S. support for liberal values and democracy in Ukraine went beyond the paradigm of exclusively deepening American influence in the post-Soviet space and Washington's assistance to the Ukrainian government to deter the aggressor received an objective character. Already during the first year of the Russian-Ukrainian conflict, this assistance, in addition to diplomacy, covered the financial, military-technical, and sanctions spheres. In December 2014, US President B. Obama signed the Ukraine Freedom Support Act of 2014, approved by the US Congress, according to which Ukraine's support for Ukraine from the United States became part of the official foreign policy line.

Moreover, Russia's aggression against Ukraine has obviously changed the USA's approach to Russia as a leading player in the post-Soviet and European space in general. While in the National Security Strategy, the main document which determines the major presidential priorities in foreign policy, of 2010 under B. Obama, Russia was perceived as a partner; the relevant document of 2015 qualified Russia as an aggressor. «We will deter Russian aggression, remain alert to its strategic capabilities, and help our allies and partners resist Russian coercion over the long term, if necessary», the document says. The specificity of the U.S. National Security Strategy (NSS) of 2015 was the special attention to Ukraine in the system of foreign policy guidelines of the United States, which is reflected in such sections as security, prosperity, values, and international order. At the same time, Ukrainian topics were not limited to the interests of Ukraine alone, confirming the USA's course to support democratically oriented countries of the postSoviet space. As noted, «We will support partners such as Georgia, Moldova, and Ukraine so they can better work alongside the United States and NATO, as well as provide for their own defense» [21].

It should be noted that the political line towards Russia, outlined in the NSS in 2015 under B. Obama's presidency was further confirmed in the documents of the strategic level of President D. Trump's Republican administration (since 2017) despite Trump's contradictory statements as a presidential candidate about the possibility of agreeing» with the Russian Federation. Moreover, under Trump's administration, an outright confrontation began to be traced along the line of the Russian Federation and the United States when Russia's aggression in the post-Soviet space, for example, in Georgia and Ukraine, began to be perceived by the American side as a threat to the European stability and influence of the United States on the European continent. «Although the menace of Soviet communism is gone, new threats test our will,» the document states. «Russia is using subversive measures to weaken the credibility of America's commitment to Europe, undermine transatlantic unity, and weaken European institutions and governments. With its invasions of Georgia and Ukraine, Russia demonstrated its willingness to violate the sovereignty of states in the region. Russia continues to intimidate its neighbors with threatening behavior, such as nuclear posturing and the forward deployment of offensive capabilities» [22].

The line in support of Ukraine (in the context of the ongoing Russian-Ukrainian conflict) was reflected in the platform of the newly-elected Biden administration from 2020. On February 24, 2022, as the beginning of Russia's large-scale aggression, the Biden administration, with the support of Congress, advocated an increase in comprehensive support for Ukraine as a priority direction of US foreign policy.

Since Russia launched its full-scale war on Ukraine, the United States has provided $32.6 billion and, in total, pledged more than $100 billion in security assistance as of March 21, 2023. Before that, starting in 2014, when Russia started its war in Donbas and annexed Crimea, until 2022, America contributed only about three billion dollars [9].

In this section, several key trends in terms of U.S. aid to Ukraine after February 24, 2022, must be outlined. First, it is important to mention that most security assistance has been approved through supplemental appropriations. But when it comes to the presidential dimension, it has been used to supply Ukraine with weapons from the Department of Defense stocks. According to the Congressional Research Service, almost $26 billion of $49 billion of the 2022 and 2023 fiscal years (as of late March 2023) have been allocated to Ukraine only from the presidential drawdowns [10]. Another important fact is that part of the aforementioned amount of almost $49 billion, in particular, included almost $26 billion, which aimed to refill the stocks of the Department of Defense (DOD) security assistance coming to Ukraine.

This tendency showed that the U.S. administration was eager to react to Ukraine's rapidly changing needs. Furthermore, the decision to replenish DOD stocks but provide Ukraine with weapons that could be transferred quickly is another indicator that arming Kyiv to defend itself is one of the priorities of the administration [11]. However, this policy focus was reaffirmed only after the first year of the full-scale war had passed. As U.S. Undersecretary of Defense for Policy Dr. Kahl mentioned, America had also increased its production of critical munitions and equipment and, to some extent, has doubled/tripled its capacities [16].

Speaking about another program, the Ukraine Security Assistance Initiative (USAI), it is worth mentioning that the Department of Defense provided $1.7 billion in addition to $6.3 billion to Ukraine. At the same time, before Russia launched the full-scale war in 2022, the security assistance received was $275 million [11]. That trend indicates that the

United States was flexible enough to address Ukraine's needs while ensuring proper capacity building.

One of the important aspects of the United States being Ukraine's largest supporter is that in addition to military aid, Washington provides Kyiv with massive economic aid, including direct support to the government's budget. As of late February 2023, according to the US treasury secretary, the United States also provided around $50 million in economic aid. In particular, US aid enabled the Ukrainian government to pay the salaries of its civil servants, as Ukraine's budget funds had to be reallocated to the needs of its Armed Forces. The key principle of economic aid is stated as follows: «the US cannot allow Ukraine to lose the war for economic reasons when it has shown an ability to succeed on the battlefield» [40]. With regard to policy efforts, it can be argued that the American administration might be willing to lead the reconstruction efforts as well, but its normative costs and principles have yet to be determined and implemented.

Speaking about the second, Congressional dimension, it is important to state that Congress has played an important role in ensuring that emergency assistance is allocated. At the same time, we did not seek to analyze how many initiatives related to supporting Ukraine have been registered since February 2022 and how many resulted in actual legislation, as this amount has constantly been growing. As for Congress's role in supplying Ukraine with defensive weapons, it should be noted that of the supplemental $113 billion allocated in the 2022 and 2023 fiscal years, at least $62 billion, or 55%, was provided to the U.S. Department of Defense (DOD). The Congressional Research Service noted that part of the DOD funding is designed to increase capacity building within Ukraine's armed forces, particularly training sessions, for tactics and military equipment, which can be assessed as a long-term American security investment [9].

This policy statement has been reaffirmed by prior intensified training in addition to the previous American training based in western Ukraine of almost 30 000 soldiers from 2015 to 2022, which has led to at least 300 Ukrainian armed forces being trained by U.S. counterparts per year [42]. One of the examples is that the Biden administration arranged a highly intensive training session on operating a Patriot battery air defense system almost immediately after the announcement on the allocation had been made. According to TIME, such training could require nearly a year for Ukraine's armed forces to operate successfully. The administration also reviewed granting Ukraine a Patriot system before any other country, as a symbolic step but also a vital one [2]. In addition, several months have passed and the Ukrainian crew proved its readiness to operate the air defense systems effectively much faster than US instructors expected [39]. Furthermore, U.S.- Ukraine security cooperation has deepened to such an extent that the U.S. Department of Defense is considering creating a special department to be in charge of the U.S. aid to Ukraine specifically [24].

Another policy indicator is that the Department of Defense had not only repurposed a large part of its funds to assist Ukraine but also conducted and ensured proper oversight for future assignments [10]. The reason to put this paragraph in the Congressional dimension is that the government is typically accountable to the legislative branch, and the American system of government is no exception. The aim of this article is not to expand the oversight efforts, but we conclude that the amount of aid is unprecedented, as only the United Kingdom received security and economic assistance from America in 1946-2019 more than any other country, but Ukraine received almost three times more aid in constant dollars [12, 8].

Policy efforts of the administration have concluded that oversight doesn't lead to revealing misuse of American aid to Ukraine. In the meantime, the amount of policy efforts indicates that is another priority for the administration, the fact that the Office of Inspector General, the Agency for International Development, the U.S. Department of State, and the U.S. Department of Defense together came up with a joint strategic oversight plan for Ukraine, underlining that oversight efforts alone cost $42 million and involve more than 20 projects [35].

As the largest donor of military and economic aid to Ukraine, not only in retrospect but throughout 2022-2023 as well, according to the Kiel Institute for the World Economy as of March 2023, the United States shows an example to other nations and led a coalition of allies and partners [32]. One of the priorities of the Biden administration is to ensure Ukraine's armed forces will have as much defensive weaponry as possible. One way to do it is to provide assistance, which the Biden administration has done, but another way in terms of global politics is ensuring that closest partners and allies work to increase their own bilateral and multilateral assistance to a country in need.

The third component of Biden's administration's support to Ukraine is redefining US leadership within NATO and in the newly created Ukraine Defense Contact Group. With regard to the contact group, also called Ramstein, as the majority of meetings took place at the United States Ramstein Air Base in Germany, it can be assessed that American leadership has encouraged other nations to increase contributions to Ukraine. In particular, it is relevant to the air defense system delivered to Ukraine. What is more, Patriot systems have been donated to Ukraine by Germany and the Netherlands following the U.S. announcement of the like. But more importantly, from a symbolic perspective, the U.S. defense secretary has been leading the meetings in the format of a Contact Group group [42], which attracted not only NATO allies but many other states beyond Europe and which are not bound by any treaty with Ukraine or the U.S.

Responding to Russia's war of aggression, NATO allies established four new battlegroups to bolster the Eastern flank in Slovakia, Hungary, Bulgaria and Romania. According to Colin Kahl, the U.S. under secretary of defense for policy, since February 2022, the United States has deployed or extended more than 20,000 additional U.S. forces in Europe and established the first permanent U.S. force on NATO's eastern flank [14].

The decision to advance US aid to Ukraine corresponds with the existing doctrine and some democratic theory is required to explain our approach. As a representative and consolidated democracy, the American government does not have any other considerable option but to continue to support Ukraine. As Bartels argued, representative democracy hinges on the responsiveness of elected officials to the preferences and interests of their constituents. What is more, the American public has had a strong record of demanding the authorities increase defense spending [1]. Another trend that is indicated by the abovementioned empirical evidence is also supported in the existing literature on defense spending in America when it comes to long-term international threats, in particular, posed by a rival state, which is applicable to Russia and the United States [43]. At the same time, using qualitative research, Sharp suggests that strategic defense initiatives are likely to be successful if the resources are steered to new priorities, which in U.S. policy toward Europe can result in more significant defense expenditure [28].

The noted approach deals mainly not only with the capabilities of the U.S. administration to present the necessary aid to Ukraine but also with the intentions of Biden's administration to implement related courses in accordance with approved political (or ideological) positions of the current American foreign policy. So, the central argument in this respect is that the unwavering American support for Ukraine is enshrined in the so-called Biden doctrine; therefore, it may last, as President Biden has stated, for as long as it takes - which means until Ukraine's victory. The latter refers to the full restoration of sovereignty and territorial integrity of Ukraine in its internationally recognized borders.

The major features of the Biden doctrine have been reflected in the National Security Strategy of the Biden administration, which was published later in 2022 than expected because of Russia's full-scale war on Ukraine, addressed Russia and China at the same time as the major adversaries of the United States [20]. «The PRC and Russia are increasingly aligned with each other... We will prioritize maintaining an enduring competitive edge over the PRC while constraining a still profoundly dangerous Russia», the strategic document states [National Security Strategy [23]. And then, regarding Russian aggression: «We are leading a united, principled, and resolute response to Russia's invasion and we have rallied the world to support the Ukrainian people as they bravely defend their country».

The Biden administration confirmed that, working with a broad and durable international coalition, America has marshaled near-record levels of security assistance to ensure Ukraine has the means to defend itself. «We have provided humanitarian, economic, and development assistance to strengthen Ukraine's sovereign, elected government and help the millions of refugees who have been forced to flee their homes. We will continue to stand with the people of Ukraine as they fight back against Russia's naked aggression. And we will rally the world to hold Russia accountable for the atrocities they have unleashed across Ukraine. Alongside our allies and partners, America is helping to make Russia's war on Ukraine a strategic failure. Across Europe, NATO and the European Union are united in standing up to Russia and defending shared values [23].

We may state that the Biden foreign policy doctrine can be perceived as supporting democracies in the fight against autocracies so that more states may choose the democratic path over the authoritarian one. Besides that, unlike other contributors to the Biden doctrine and its European and Ukrainian dimensions, in particular, we claim that the new containment, similar to the Truman doctrine, is not only possible but is already taking place [27]. The only major difference we imply is that the containment is designed both for China in Russia, while President Truman designed his containment toward the Soviet Union. However, what is also similar is that Biden's doctrine aims to defend a set of democratic values, the same way President Truman designed his foreign policy vision.

Another side of the approach, according to the Biden National Security Strategy, is that democratic governance consistently outperforms authoritarianism in protecting human dignity, leads to more prosperous and resilient societies, creates stronger and more reliable economic and security partners for the United States, and encourages a peaceful world order. This idea has also been supported by several researchers who claim that, in some way, nations outside the United States appraise democracy because it also identifies with American power globally [36]. At the same time, as Werner notes, an appeal to the «interests» of any state also requires pure conceptualization, which he considers through the lenses of survival and sovereignty [37]. In this article, we view «survival» when reviewing American interests and Biden's doctrine as survival of the US-led, rules-based world order and «sovereignty» of not only American territory but also the sovereign territory of NATO allies. Given that Article 5 of the Washington Treaty formulates the collective defense principle, the war next door is perceived in Washington as a threat to survival and sovereignty [25]. We claim this is a new approach to some extent, as Kagan argued, that the United States would not be threatened if Ukraine fell, but the liberal order would be [18]. We elaborate on what the author called the defense of Ukraine as a defense of liberal hegemony.

At the same time, we also consider the American support for Ukraine, and therefore Biden's doctrine, from a realist perspective. Given that the current world order may change after Russia's defeat in Ukraine, we view this theory as essential because it considers the state interests at its core and not the existing system of international relations [16]. First, the understanding of the role of the state in this concept was chronologically formed in the post-world war II period, and the theory distinguishes between countries that want to maintain the status quo within the system and revisionist countries that seek change [29]. Second, some scholars directly claim that foreign aid emerges directly from the material hierarchy of the postwar world, and the empirical experience of the role of US aid since the Marshall Plan demonstrates that it has resulted in relative peace, interdependence, and growth in the world economy, consistent with the paradigm that guided the Truman administration in designing international aid policy [12]. That is why supporting Ukraine doesn't come only from a situational perspective but has deep roots, in addition to core American interests in Europe.

Besides, we state that the United States, as a consolidated democracy, cannot ignore what the American public thinks about the administration's agenda [15]. Therefore, in particular, in the U.S. context, the establishment should take into account that adhering to public opinion is one way to maintain public support [31]. Let's look at the public view of the USA's active involvement in world affairs. It indicates that in May 1987, only 32% agreed that America should take a leading role, while in 2019, this number increased to 48% [31]. In relation to U.S. efforts in assisting Kyiv, it can be argued that according to credible pollsters like Gallup, 65% provide support to Ukraine reclaiming territory, even in the circumstances of prolonged conflict [41].

We do not seek to analyze partisan support in detail in this article, but 39% of Americans, regardless of their party affiliation, believe that the U.S. provided the right amount of assistance, and 30% also believe the Administration can do more; we assume that actions of the administration are backed by the American people. That said, if such support is maintained at a similar level, Ukraine can count on more prolonged assistance. This trend is partly confirmed by the aggregator of American polls FiveThirtyEight, which claims that around 64 percent of Americans preferred their elected officials to support US aid to Ukraine [6].

war united state policy support

Conclusions

It should be noted that the trend toward American aid to Ukraine is widely seen as the one contributing not only to Ukraine's victory over the aggressor, but also to the U.S. core strategic advantages aimed at strengthening American liberal values and the democratic world order. Ideologically, support for Ukraine by the current American administration is reflected in the so-called Biden doctrine, outlined in the U.S. National Security Strategy of 2022, where the circle of attention is both the traditional (since the mid - 1990s) line in support of the country that has embarked on the reformation path of development and the growing need to protect the stability and democratic development of Europe as part of the Western world and Western civilization.

Another research issue that may be addressed in the new U.S. policy-making decisions to sustain Ukraine's abilities for counteroffensive operations until the Biden Administration's first term ends in addition to a comparison between U.S. aid to Ukraine and other Kyiv's partners.

Support for Ukraine at the level of the American political establishment and American society makes it possible to argue that the United States will remain a reliable ally in the protection of Ukrainian sovereignty and independence. Like the Truman Doctrine, this can be compared to the long-term prospect of defending Ukraine, as part of the liberal world, from any further aggression with deterrence, in particular, Russia, which poses a threat to the liberal West. However, the very factor of such support is currently only prognostic in nature, and requires further efforts from both the American and the world community as a whole in shaping trends and prospects for the development of the anti-Russia coalition. Under such conditions, implementing the Biden doctrine will mark a milestone that, compared with other manifestations of U.S. foreign policy doctrine, determines the stability and advancement of democracy for the United States and the world.

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