US President Donald Trump intends to revise the program of military assistance to Ukraine with a view to its conformity to American interests. With an appropriate request, he turned to his national security team, Politico reports citing an unnamed source in the administration.

The team, which will have to analyze the costs of the “Ukrainian Security Assistance Initiative”, according to the source of the publication, will include Trump's national security adviser John Bolton and Pentagon chief Mark Esper.

According to Politico, the president intends to ensure the primacy of US interests in matters of foreign aid and make sure that other countries "pay their fair share." However, as explained by journalists, both parties are in favor of expanding military assistance to Ukraine.

According to congressmen, these funds are “critical to curbing Russia,” Politico writes.

“We know that funding for the Ukraine Security Initiative is being delayed,” said Evan Hollander, representative of the House Appropriations Committee. “We have serious concerns about the freezing of these important allocated funds, and we urgently ask the administration why they are holding up these resources.”

In fiscal 2019, the United States allocated $ 250 million for military assistance to Ukraine. According to the draft budget adopted by the Senate for the fiscal year 2020, the amount planned is even higher - $ 300 million.

  • US President Donald Trump
  • Reuters

“For a successful election campaign”

It is worth noting that Trump has repeatedly expressed dissatisfaction with the fact that the United States allocates significant funds to help foreign countries. During talks with leaders of the European countries of NATO, he raises questions about their financing of defense.

So, Trump calls on France and Germany to fulfill their obligations and to finance defense spending of at least 2% of GDP.

Experts admit that Trump could indeed give such an order. So, according to the expert of the International Institute for Humanitarian and Political Studies, Vladimir Bruter, it may be connected with the election campaign.

“I really believe that in order to conduct a successful election campaign, to pursue some kind of his own policy, Trump is ready to change his attitude towards Ukraine. The question is what and how will happen, what the conclusions will be, ”he told RT.

However, as Vladimir Olenchenko, a senior fellow at the Center for European Studies at IMEMO RAS, noted, Bolton and Esper, whom Trump allegedly appointed as inspectors, are among the so-called hawks of American politics who will support funding for Ukraine.

“Indeed, there is such information that Trump said about the revision, but, in fact, it’s probably just to bring the state of this assistance in line. John Bolton and Mark Esper were also appointed as executors, both of them are politicians called hawks, supporters of US aggressive foreign policy, so there is no reason that Congress will be worried, ”he said in an interview with RT.

So, according to Olenchenko, by organizing such a check, Washington gets the opportunity to send inspectors to Ukraine to verify the cost-effectiveness of these funds.

“From the US, there were very serious claims against Poroshenko, he was openly called a corrupt politician. Therefore, I think that one of the processes called revision will be verification. It enables the United States to send its lawyers, inspectors there to check how it was implemented as intended, ”the political scientist added.

At the same time, US military assistance to Ukraine is more of a demonstrational nature and does not affect the defense capabilities of Kiev, said Bruter.

“In itself, American military assistance to Ukraine does not have any fundamental significance, it is rather an element of politics or even an element of demonstration, which has no special relation to the military capabilities of Ukraine,” he said.