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Stevenson’s army, October 3

– John Kelly tells the truth about Trump. WaPo analyzes.

– NYT describes evolution of GOP attack Mexico proposals.

-US sees corruption danger in Ukraine.

-WSJ sees Chinese gains in Arctic

– “Black Hawk Down” 30 years ago: Mark Bowden has new document; Andrew Exum sees a lesson learned

-Former GOP congressman has some regrets.

From Politico:

MATH IS HARD: Over the past month, we’ve seen some wildly different numbers about how much total aid Washington is giving Ukraine. The Center for Strategic and International Studies says it’s $135 billion, The Washington Post wrote over the weekend that it’s around $60 billion, POLITICO and others have written that it’s more than $100 billion.

That’s because the smaller number (currently $73 billion in aid) is often cited from the Kiel Institute, which tracks only funds that have been delivered directly to Ukraine, CSIS’ Cancian and the Council on Foreign Relations’ JONATHAN MASTERS told NatSec Daily. Higher estimations show the total Ukraine-related packages requested by the White House, which include funds for American forces, aid to NATO allies and other things that don’t appear in the Kiel database, they said.

“The divergence in dollar figures reported by various outlets likely muddles the debate to an extent, particularly when you’re talking about tens of billions,” Masters said, adding that he prefers the Kiel Institute’s data because it clearly compares U.S. aid to other countries’ assistance.

Neither figure is better or more accurate — it’s a matter of preference: “I think the appropriations total” — the higher figure — “is a better number because it captures all of the U.S. efforts as a result of the war in Ukraine,” he said.

Cancian recommended outlets and think tanks, if they use the larger number, describe it as something like “U.S. efforts as a result of the war in Ukraine” instead of “U.S. aid to Ukraine.” Masters also called on outlets and think tanks to be clearer in defining how they came to a number.

My SAIS colleague Charlie Stevenson distributes this almost daily news digest of foreign/defense/national security policy to “Stevenson’s army” via Googlegroups. I republish here, with occasional videos of my choice. To get Stevenson’s army by email, send a blank email (no subject or text in the body) to stevensons-army+subscribe@googlegroups.com. You’ll get an email confirming your join request. Click “Join This Group” and follow the instructions to join. Once you have joined, you can adjust your email delivery preferences (if you want every email or a digest of the emails).