Pedro's Bait And Switch: The Military Aid That Wasn't...
Pictured: Pedro Sánchez addresses media alongside Mette Frederiksen and Volodymyr Zelenskyy
On 21st of April, Spanish Prime Minister, Pedro Sánchez, held a press conference in Kyiv, alongside Danish Prime Minister, Mette Frederiksen, and Ukrainian President, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, and said the following, “I want to announce that a new batch of weapons has been sent to Ukraine. The Spanish ship Isabel, which today departed from a Spanish port for Poland, carries 200 tonnes of ammunition and other materials, 30 trucks loaded with military supplies, and 20 armored vehicles.”
Unsurprisingly, this was interpreted by almost everyone - both international and domestic Spanish media and the Ukrainians - at face value. Ukraine would get 200 tonnes of ammunition and other war materiel, as well as the 30 trucks and 20 armored vehicles, all of which the Ukrainians desperately needed.
But this was not the case. The 30 trucks and 20 armored vehicles unloaded from the Isabel, drove to the Polish/Ukrainian border, dumped their supplies, and then turned around and went home. To add insult to injury, the supplies donated were of poor quality compared to materiel received from other Western countries. It should go without saying that the Ukrainians were decidedly unimpressed by this situation.
Sánchez’s deception was even more cynical given that before the press conference, the Spanish Prime Minister had visited the town of Borodyanka to witness for himself the devastation that had been caused by the Russian assault. It was also successful enough that even nearly two months later, various assessments of Western military aid to Ukraine still include the 30 trucks, and 20 armored vehicles that never arrived.