It's possible we're already in WWIII, and only future historians will be able to see that.
But if Zelenskyy "starts WWIII," I'd be surprised, seeing as he has absolutely no WMDs of his own. Arming Ukraine with defensive Javelin-style missiles and cheap drones seems to be working just fine, and these kinds of weapons pose no serious threat to Russia.
As for the $40 billion, I would have preferred it come out of the hundreds of billions of dollars of seized/frozen Russian wealth worldwide. (Apparently, we instead have to respect war criminals' blood-soaked war chests even as they are violating international humanitarian law left and right.)
But even so, as RMK says, this is a small drop in the bucket of our annual military budget. Dollar-for-dollar, funding the Ukrainian army is the best means we have of degrading Russian capabilities. This isn't like pouring trillions of dollars into Afghanistan only to watch it all melt away because the "Afghan state" was an illusion. The Ukrainians are a cohesive and effective fighting force, and are quickly becoming the world's foremost authorities in how to fight Russia.
Even if you give zero F's about Ukraine itself, the country works as a shield to keep Russia from invading the Baltic states next and giving NATO a real test. Our aid also pays for itself in terms of deterring China, which is watching all this carefully. If Russia had rolled over Ukraine easily, then China's seizure of Taiwan would have been next.
If you're mad about gas prices, redirect some of your rage toward the energy companies. They are making a killing off of all this. It's obscene. But short of "socialist" interventions like price ceilings, there's not much to stop companies from engaging in profiteering.
