American Republicans and their White House candidate Donald Trump should remember that they are the party of Ronald Reagan and support Ukraine as Russian forces build up for a major offensive from May or June.
This was the message of Andriy Yermak, chief of staff of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, in an interview with "Politico" in Kyiv on Thursday evening.
Asked if he feared Trump would be re-elected, or that President Joe Biden's $60 billion aid package for Ukraine would not ultimately pass the Republican-controlled House of Representatives, where it has been held up for months by loyal Trump supporters, Ermak said: "I don't believe Republicans would forget the Reagan presidency from 1981-1989 and his Cold War crusade against the "evil empire." in Moscow.
"I do not believe that anyone representing the party of Ronald Reagan will abandon Ukraine. "Reagan understood the Soviet Union and Russia, and anyone who does will continue to support our fighters because they understand that dictators never give up willingly and that's why they have to be stopped," he said.
Ermak, who minutes earlier had just spoken by phone with Biden's national security adviser, Jake Sullivan, remained confident that the aid would eventually be approved.
He's not sure when that will happen, but he insisted it should happen soon. "In the meantime, this is costing us lives, and I very much hope it passes this month, because Ukraine is approaching a critical moment," he said.
Biden aides are working behind the scenes to ensure that House Speaker Mike Johnson puts the Ukraine aid package up for a vote as early as next week.
Biden publicly pressured House Republicans to pass the package, but avoided attacking the speaker, preferring to give him room to persuade his GOP faction.
Zelensky and his top officials are also quietly lobbying Republicans. The Ukrainian president revealed last week that he had a phone conversation with Johnson in which he outlined the importance of the aid package to Ukraine and detailed the surge in missile and drone strikes and the devastation they are causing, particularly to the country's energy infrastructure.
Ukraine's strikes over the past three weeks are part of a campaign to soften it up in preparation for a major Russian offensive, Ermak said.
He sees the northeastern city of Kharkiv, Ukraine's second largest, as the most likely target for the main strike in a possible attack. Kharkiv came under particularly ferocious attack, and large-scale Russian attacks destroyed its power plants.
"We know that Putin is preparing a new wave of mobilization, and we believe that the new counteroffensive operations of the Russians may begin in late May or early June. Of course, we have to be ready for it,'' Yermak said. "We still critically need additional air defense systems, because without them it is impossible to defend our cities," he added.
Yermak said more Patriot surface-to-air missiles are also needed to protect the front lines, where the Russians are inflicting massive damage and some fear the military balance is tipping.
Russia uses 1.5-tonne bombs, which are a reworking of an old Soviet-era weapon, and are delivered by warplanes about 70 kilometers from the target, then use a guidance system of deployable wings through which they plan to the goal. They were used in the recent Russian offensive in the Donetsk region and wreaked havoc in the defense of Avdeyevka, a town in eastern Ukraine that fell to Russia last month.
"But again, the problem for us is time," says Ermak. "I would like to emphasize that now is a critical moment. It is very important that the package be approved this month," he added.
When asked whether Ukraine would heed U.S. pleas to avoid striking Russian oil facilities, Yermak avoided direct comment. Last week, Zelensky said in an interview with the Washington Post that targeting Russia's energy infrastructure is a legitimate military strategy.
Yermak expanded on this by saying that "there must be retribution for what the Russians are doing to us. We must destroy their critical infrastructure - because the only language they understand is power."