Trump allies caught off guard by Pentagon's Ukraine weapons freeze
Both the White House and the State Department pushed back on the notion that the munitions pause caught administration officials off guard. 'This is false,' said a White House official who was granted anonymity to talk about an ongoing review. 'The president and top officials expect the DOD to regularly review aid allocations to ensure they are in line with the America First agenda.'
But the official wouldn't say exactly when the president and top aides were made aware of the decision to stop the weapons shipment, saying only that they knew 'prior to the story' POLITICO published on Tuesday.
Colby did not immediately respond to a request for comment on his role in the decision. In a statement sent from a White House spokesperson Tuesday evening, Colby said that the Pentagon 'continues to provide the president with robust options to continue military aid to Ukraine' while 'rigorously examining and adapting its approach … while also preserving U.S. forces' readiness.' He said the original reporting was 'an attempt to portray division that does not exist.'
During a Friday briefing on Ukraine for Congress, officials from the State Department and the Pentagon made no mention of the pause and are not answering official inquiries about it, a congressional aide said.
The aide added that Ukraine has a 'critical need for continued replenishment of various arms given continued Russian assault,' particularly air defense like Patriot interceptors, long-range rockets and conventional shells, which have been stopped.
Across the Atlantic, European diplomats and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy's team were scrambling to find out why the U.S. had abruptly frozen aid once the White House confirmed the news. Neither Zelenskyy nor the European Union received advanced notice, according to a European official and a Ukrainian adviser.
The U.S. and Ukraine are working to set up a call between Trump and Zelenskyy, two people familiar with the planning said. The idea was set in motion on Tuesday as word began filtering out that the U.S. had slammed the brakes on shipments of the weapons to Ukraine.
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