Ukraine conflict helps prepare for potential China clash – Pentagon

The Pentagon will use the lessons learned from supplying military aid to Ukraine to help Taiwan in a potential conflict with China, US Deputy Secretary of Defense Kathleen Hicks has said.

“There are many advantages we’ve gained for a potential Pacific challenge from the Ukraine conflict,” Hicks told Bloomberg in an interview published on Wednesday. “We’re learning now to grow our industrial base and to study that industrial base, which has been for the last 60 years in a bit of a feast and famine cycle.”

The conflict highlighted the difficulties of quickly procuring enough weapons and equipment for Kiev, Hicks explained. The US repeatedly used the Presidential Drawdown Authority (PDA) to speed up the transfer of stockpiles to Ukraine and plans to do the same with Taiwan.

“We’re thinking about how we use those authorities right now to generate faster and higher-capacity delivery of munitions to provide to our forces in the Pacific,” Hicks said, adding that the Pentagon has “a clear strategy that’s focused on China.”