Order by Hegseth to cancel Ukraine weapons caught White House off guard

https://www.reuters.com/world/us/order-by-hegseth-cancel-ukraine-weapons-caught-white-house-off-guard-2025-05-06/

33 comments

  1. Sounds like Putin went past Donald to Hegseth to give the order.

  2. Who’s in charge when no one is in charge?

    Reminds me of an old story by Old Bull Lee – that one Jack Kerouac wrote about – one of those “Twilight’s Last Gleaming” stories.

  3. The president was unaware of Hegseth’s order, as were other top national security officials in the meeting, according to two sources briefed on the private White House discussions and another with direct knowledge of the matter.

    Asked to comment on this report, the White House told Reuters that Hegseth had followed a directive from Trump to pause aid to Ukraine, which it said was the administration’s position at the time. It did not explain why, according to those who spoke to Reuters, top national security officials in the normal decision making process didn’t know about the order or why it was so swiftly reversed.

    “Negotiating an end to the Russia-Ukraine War has been a complex and fluid situation. We are not going to detail every conversation among top administration officials throughout the process,” said Karoline Leavitt, the White House spokeswoman. “The bottom line is the war is much closer to an end today than it was when President Trump took office.”

    The cancelations cost TRANSCOM $2.2 million, according to the records reviewed by Reuters. In response to a request for comment, TRANSCOM said that the total cost was $1.6 million – 11 flights were canceled but one incurred no charge.

    An order halting military aid authorized under the Biden administration went into effect officially a month later, on March 4, with a White House announcement.

    The story of how flights were canceled, detailed by Reuters for the first time, points to an at-times haphazard policy-making process within the Trump administration and a command structure that is unclear even to its own ranking members.

    The multiday pause of the flights, confirmed by five people with knowledge of it, also shows confusion in how the administration has created and implemented national security policy. At the Pentagon, the disarray is an open secret, with many current and former officials saying the department is plagued by internal disagreements on foreign policy, deep-seated grudges, and inexperienced staff.

    Reuters couldn’t establish exactly when Hegseth’s office ordered the freight flights canceled. Two sources said Ukrainian and European officials began asking about the pause on February 2. The TRANSCOM records indicate that there was a verbal order from “SECDEF” – the secretary of defense – that stopped the flights and that they had resumed by February 5.

    “This is consistent with the administration’s policy to move fast, break things and sort it out later. That is their managing philosophy,” said Mark Cancian, a retired Marine officer and defense expert with the Center for Strategic and International Studies think tank. “That is great for Silicon Valley. But when you’re talking about institutions that have been around for hundreds of years, you are going to run into problems.”
    The stop in shipments caused consternation in Kyiv.
    The Ukrainians quickly asked the administration through multiple channels but had difficulty obtaining any useful information, according to a Ukrainian official with direct knowledge of the situation. In later conversations with the Ukrainians, the administration wrote off the pause as “internal politics,” said the source. Ukrainian officials did not respond to requests for comment.

    The shipping of American weapons to Ukraine requires sign-off from multiple agencies and can take weeks or even months to complete, depending on the size of the cargo. The majority of US military assistance goes through a logistics hub in Poland before being picked up by Ukrainian representatives and transported into the country.

    That hub can hold shipments for extended periods of time. It’s not clear if the 11 canceled flights were the only ones scheduled that week in February, how much aid was already stockpiled in Poland and if it continued to flow into Ukraine despite the TRANSCOM orders.

    The revelations come at a time of upheaval in the department. Several of Hegseth’s top advisers were escorted from the building April 15 after being accused of unauthorized disclosure of classified information. The secretary continues to face scrutiny, including from Congress, about his own communications. Previously he’s attributed allegations of upheaval to disgruntled employees.

    The canceled flights contained weapons that had long been approved by the Biden administration, authorized by lawmakers on Capitol Hill.

    Reuters couldn’t determine if Hegseth or his team knew how the order to TRANSCOM would play out or that the order would be a substantial change in U.S. policy on Ukraine. Three sources familiar with the situation said Hegseth misinterpreted discussions with the president about Ukraine policy and aid shipments without elaborating further.

    Four other people briefed on the situation said a small cadre of staffers inside the Pentagon, many of whom have never held a government job and who have for years spoken out against U.S. aid to Ukraine, advised Hegseth to consider pausing aid to the country.

    Two people familiar with the matter denied there was a true cutoff in aid. One of them described it as a logistical pause.
    “(They) just wanted to get a handle on what was going on and people, as a result, misinterpreted that as: ‘You need to stop everything,’” said one.

  4. “Order by Hegseth…” would be two tallboys, a bottle of Wild Turkey, a box of port wine, 12 tequila shots, and a collins glass filled to the brim with Sambuca. Oh, and one glass of Chardonnay for that evenings lady companion.

  5. >**The president was unaware of Hegseth’s order**, as were other top national security officials in the meeting,

    Considering that Trump is barely aware of where he is or what year it is these days, that’s hardly a surprise. It’s still shocking, though, that he takes zero interest in a major geopolitical crisis that directly impacts US national security. But I’m sure it’s much more important to make movies more expensive or reopen the most expensive prison in America.

  6. He’ll stick around longer than most because he gives dear leader the blind loyalty he craves, as well a direct line to Fox News. But this cat is going to eventually fuckup so epically that even Trump will want to drop him like it’s hot. I give him a year.

  7. So a real American government is supposed to act. The right Hand doesn’t know what the Left is doing, and the President didn’t have a clue. For this, we have voted?

  8. Donald Trump: I *only hire the best people*. The best at being the worst. The best at ass kissing. The best at incompetency. The best at saying I am the best.

  9. Can someone just kick this drunk fucker to the curb where he belongs already?

  10. I didn’t know hegseth controlled this process in any way

  11. > We are not going to detail every conversation among top administration officials throughout the process,” said Karoline Leavitt

    Those are so clearly the words of someone who doesn’t know what’s going on.

  12. Ope, He went around Trump, by god, he disrespected your king, best get that guy out.

  13. When the cat has late-stage dementia, the mice will play.

  14. Yet another example of Trump’s aides doing things he is wholly unaware of happening.

  15. And the GOP told us that Biden was mentally checked out and not at the helm.

    Another projection?

  18. The biggest issue is that half of the country is completely unaware of the absolute chaos, malfeasance, and negligence at the top of our government and they will never find out due to the conservative propaganda bubble. Until that changes no one will be held accountable.

  19. Hegseth needs to be in a cell counting tiles ad infinitum.  He’s cartoonishly evil he looks like kreese from cobra Kai I mean just look at the mother.  Signal fiasco was a fever dream of evil intent.

  20. Putin’s cock is deeper in Hegseth than it is Donald Trump.

  21. >Negotiating an end to the Russia-Ukraine War has been a complex and fluid situation.

    The Russian-Ukraine war? Shouldn’t this be called “The Russina invasion of Ukraine?”

  23. They thought he’d post something in the group chat first lmao

  24. The president is not in charge, but rather the Fox News personality that copies his wife and lawyer on national security chats.

  25. Hegseth needs to be fired and prosecuted for treason and espionage.

  26. So the White House is the only one NOT in Hegseth’s Signal chats???

  27. Hegseth got a Signal message from his Russian operators to sabotage the deals. Nothing to see here.

  28. Lolllll he went past Trump? Looks like Putin has another bitch in his pocket. I can’t wait to see how the WH spins this new bullshit. What a failure of a country we’ve become.

    I will never stop being spiteful to every Conservative who voted for this and for every non-voter because of their “both parties are bad” bullshit. Fuck y’all.

  29. What does Trump see in this guy. He’s given him free reign. Like why….

  30. what a bunch of unorganized grabasstic pieces of amphibian shit

  31. Step one-put totally unqualified people in charge of all the very important departments of government.
    Step two-let them do whatever they want.

    This is not going to end well.

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