Should the US Arm Ukraine? A Debate

an aggressor, and clearly Ukraine is not an aggressor, since it is their own territory where the fighting is happening.” Yet there are several voices that believe that arming Ukraine will drive the US into a proxy war with Russia or otherwise undermine US interests.Please join the Atlantic Council and the Charles Koch Institute on Thursday, September 21 for a luncheon debate on Capitol Hill from 12:00 PM – 1:30 PM in room 203 of the Capitol Visitor’s Center. This will be the first of two debates concerning whether the United States should provide Ukraine with lethal weapons.  Ambassador (Ret) John Herbst, Director of the Dinu Patriciu Eurasia Center at the Atlantic Council and Ambassador Alexander "Sandy" Vershbow, a distinguished fellow at the Brent Scowcroft Center on International Security, will argue in the affirmative.  William Ruger, Vice President for Research and Policy at the Koch Institute, and Rajan Menon, Anne and Bernard Spitzer Chair in Political Science, The City College of New York, will argue in the negative.***Confirmed Speakers
Ambassador John Herbst, director of the Atlantic Council's Dinu Patriciu Eurasia Center, who served for thirty-one years as a foreign service officer in the US Department of State, retiring at the rank of career-minister. He was US ambassador to Ukraine from 2003 to 2006.Ambassador Alexander "Sandy" Vershbow is a distinguished fellow at the Brent Scowcroft Center on International Security. Ambassador Vershbow was the deputy secretary general of NATO from February 2012 to October 2016. Prior to his post at NATO, Ambassador Vershbow served for three years as the US assistant secretary of defense for international security affairs. In that position, he was responsible for coordinating US security and defense policies relating to the nations and international organizations of Europe (including NATO), the Middle East, and Africa. From 1977 to 2008, Vershbow was a career member of the United States Foreign Service. He served as US ambassador to NATO (1998-2001); to the Russian Federation (2001-05); and to the Republic of Korea (2005-08). 
Rajan Menon holds the Anne and Bernard Spitzer Chair in Political Science at the City College of New York/City University of New York and is a Senior Research Scholar at the Saltzman Institute of War and Peace Studies, Columbia University and a Global Ethics Fellow at the Carnegie Council on Ethics in International Affairs.
William P. Ruger is the vice president for research and policy at the Charles Koch Institute. He was previously an associate professor in the political science department at Texas State University. A veteran of the Afghanistan War, Ruger currently serves as an officer in the U.S. Navy (Reserve Component).