The Security Assistance Group (SAG) is a unit of NATO command operated in Germany that specifically focuses on the military training and development in support of Ukraine.  The U.S. is transitioning out of SAG leadership and handing the responsibility to Europe or Canada.

EUROPE – Another NATO member will eventually take over running the Security Assistance Group, according to a U.S official and three people familiar with the plan, which has played a central role in equipping and training Ukrainian troops since the full-scale Russian invasion began. But the removal of U.S. leadership from a pivotal program on the continent reinforces the extent to which America is distancing itself from European partners.

The move will mean the U.S. no longer helps shape what Ukraine’s future military will look like. It follows a swath of changes the Trump administration has made to the decades-old alliance. The Pentagon has reduced the number of American officers running commands in Europe and canceled some rotations. Officials are reassessing troops stationed on the continent and warning countries they won’t receive assistance unless their defense spending increases.

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CTH is very happy to see President Trump pause his consideration of giving Ukraine Patriot and Tomahawk missile system technology and licenses.  As noted by President Trump there is always a possibility of those systems being used against the USA if the conflict shifts and Ukraine becomes our enemy.

Germany and Ukraine have been asking for Tomahawks (offensive missile systems), while mostly Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has been requesting the Patriot (defensive) missiles.  Both systems are closely guarded, held and maintained by strict security protocols in the U.S. military arsenal.

President Trump responded to the question during his Camp David cabinet meeting (prompted):

Zelenskyy likely did himself no favors when he announced his intention to build missile and drone factories in the U.K.  No doubt several Trump administration officials noted that statement and contrast it against Zelenskyy’s requests.

It would be exceptionally risky for the USA to allow Patriot and Tomahawk systems to be built in the U.K. as the secrecy behind the technology would certainly leak and our strategic advantage lost.  It should be remembered that both the U.K and Ukraine were part of the political system attempting to remove President Trump from office.

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Well, well, well.  There it is. Even if it is clouded in Reuters News doublespeak and coded language, the answer to the big question about why Zelenskyy fired the most effective military leader is right there.  The key words are, “military procurement system”; or in common language “military spending.”

It never made sense; the 35-year-old Defense Minister, Mykhailo Fedorov, was heralded as turning the tide of the war in favor of Ukraine through his adaption of technology, specifically drones, and his very close relationship to Alex Karp of Palantir, a military contractor.  Fedorov was young, smart, strategic and exceptionally capable.  Yet, Zelenskyy fired him.

Now the real motive for dispatching Mykhailo Fedorov surfaces in his interview with Reuters.  Fedorov had taken control of how the military funding was being spent, and as a result, all of those Ukraine government officials and military generals who were pocketing money, redirecting funds, giving indulgences to their families and stealing resources were blocked.

The corruption is so widespread, Zelenskyy had no choice except to eliminate the guy taking control of the payments, Defense Minister Mykhailo Fedorov.

(July 29 – Reuters) – Former Ukrainian Defence Minister Mykhailo Fedorov, in an interview published on Wednesday, said his efforts to overhaul the military’s procurement system were the main reason behind his dismissal this ​month in a military and political shake-up.

Fedorov, a technical expert seen by many ‌as an agent for change in the nearly 4-1/2-year-old war against Russia, told the media outlet Ukrainska Pravda that the proposed changes met resistance from officials inside and around the ministry.

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Senator Lindsey Graham was having a documentary about his life and political efforts made at the time he died.  The biographical outline is scheduled to be released in the future [CITATION]. However, the Wall Street Journal was granted some excerpts of the recent filming.

In a rather telling part of the storyline, Senator Graham notes on his goal to eliminate Iran, he needed to work with Marco Rubio because Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner were in conflict to his intent.

Wall Street Journal – […] Holder is now distilling hundreds of hours of raw camera footage for a documentary currently titled “Lindsey’s Game,” which he said he wants to release in the coming months. Graham agreed to it, saying he wanted people to understand his long tenure in the Senate and hopefully inspire others to work in government. Graham repeatedly told the crew how “cool this was,” Holder said.

“He would call what this was ‘a game,’” Holder said, describing how Graham told him how bizarre he thought it was that a senator from South Carolina has a closer relationship with the Saudi Arabian leader than anyone in a Democratic or Republican administration.

The crew also filmed Graham as he talked in March with Jake Sullivan, who was national security adviser under President Joe Biden, about the challenges of working with the Trump administration on Middle East negotiations.

​“I can’t do it with Jared, and I can’t do it with Witkoff. They’re just too conflicted. It’s gotta be Rubio,” he said to Sullivan, referring to Trump’s primary envoys in the negotiations, his son-in-law Jared Kushner and his longtime friend Steve Witkoff, and his secretary of state, Marco Rubio.

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If you thought Ukraine was busy defending itself and launching counterattacks against Russia, think again.

Apparently, unbeknownst to the rest of the world Ukraine was launching geo-synchronous satellites over the Middle East, deploying proprietary signals intelligence intercepts between Russia and Iran, and conducting covert surveillance operations, in addition to weaving sweaters for homeless kittens from Zelenskyy’s hair… or something.

But seriously, read this:

[SOURCE]

Isn’t he just the most magnanimous little fella?  Not only is he singlehandedly going to win a war against Russia, but he’s going to take a few minutes break and win the war against Iran for everyone.  What a guy.

The last few weeks have been a tidal wave of weird and sketchy stuff that indicates some form of NATO intelligence operation is underway.

This round of sketchy started with that trip to London to meet the coalition of the willing and King Charles; followed two days later with the surprising “drone” attack on the Dormition Cathedral of the Kyiv-Pechersk Lavra, which bore all the same hallmarks as the Nordstream pipeline attack, which was immediately before the G7 meeting in Paris and perfectly set up the horrible Russia theme for the summit.

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A Canadian intern at NATO military headquarters in Belgium was arrested for espionage.  The name of the intern is Chinese, but to protect the Canadian government from embarrassment the nation the woman was spying for remains undisclosed.  Go figure.

The Chinese influence operations within Canadian government and politics is a subject that has been disclosed over the past few years with a great deal of consternation inside Canada.   The intern was within the SHAPE operation.

SHAPE is a strategic headquarters. Its role is to prepare, plan, conduct and execute NATO military operations, missions and tasks in order to achieve the strategic objectives of the Alliance. {Source}

SHAPE is the tip of the NATO spear on what’s called Forward Land Forces (FLF), currently operating in Eastern Europe on a mission to support the Ukraine military objectives. {SOURCE}

So, this Chinese spy from Canada was operating inside the NATO military operation that was supporting the weapon supply system for Ukraine.

(NYT) – The authorities in Belgium said on Saturday that a Canadian intern at the North Atlantic Treaty Organization’s military headquarters had been arrested on suspicion of spying for another country.

The Belgian Federal Prosecutor’s Office said the woman was “of Chinese origin” and was arrested on Friday. “She is suspected of spying on behalf of a third country and of being a member of a criminal organization,” it said in a statement, which did not identify the country or the criminal organization.

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There is a level of no-so-subtle pretense within this messaging from President Trump that is not good.

As noted in this Truth Social message, President Trump notes it is unlikely that people around Chairman Xi and people around President Putin would be providing military, logistics, targeting or weapons support for Iran for the same reason President Trump is not providing military, logistics, targeting or weapons support to Ukraine.

TRUTH SOCIAL – “President Xi, at our recent meeting in Beijing, China, told me that he would not, under any circumstances, give or sell Weapons to the Islamic Republic of Iran — And that statement included Chinese Companies. Considering our relationship, I take him at his word and, besides, l am doing him very big favors, also.

Likewise, President Putin, despite the horrible War going on in Ukraine (The relationship remains, as it does with President Zelenskyy), told me that he would not sell Weapons to Iran. He understands that I do not sell Weapons to Ukraine, but to NATO Countries. They pay full price, and how those Weapons are distributed, I have no idea.

Therefore, two major Countries that people speak of often in terms of Iran are, in my opinion, not participating. If they did, it would be very bad for them — Certainly not in their best interests. Thank you for your attention to this matter!” ~President DONALD J. TRUMP

I strongly doubt non-pretending Russian President Vladimir Putin draws a distinction between the U.S. sending drone technology and missiles to Ukraine -vs- the U.S. sending drones and military technology to NATO Germany for forwarding to Ukraine.

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There are various points of view on a controversial section 219 within the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) bill that passed the House of Representatives last night and is heading to the Senate.

Section 219 (formerly Section 224) is part of the Fiscal Year 2027 NDAA. It directs the Secretary of Defense to designate a Pentagon executive agent responsible for overseeing the United States-Israel Defense Technology Cooperation Initiative, which aims to accelerate joint research, development, testing, evaluation, and industrial cooperation between the U.S. and Israel in defense technologies; specifically: missile defense, counter-drone systems, artificial intelligence, cybersecurity, quantum computing, directed energy, biotechnology, and autonomous systems.

Many people are mistakenly viewing this section as a merge of the military; that’s not the case.  The issue is specifically about joint collaboration on missile defense systems and drone technology.  Secretary Marco Rubio was asked about it today.  Rubio’s response is outlined below:

QUESTION: Mr. Secretary, you know the Senate better than most anybody. They’re debating the new military policy bill right now after the House passed it. One of the more controversial topics is about fusing the U.S. and Israeli military when it comes to co-production on things. Do you have any sovereignty concerns about that, if there are situations where the United States wants to send weapons? Iron Dome came up with Ukraine when the Israelis —

SECRETARY RUBIO: You’re asking about NDAA? Yeah, I mean, that – largely the Department of War manages that legislative portfolio, so I’m aware of the provision you’re discussing that involves cooperation on technology. And look, at the end of the day, the truth is we do that with countries all over the world.

QUESTION: So you support it?

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Secretary of State Marco Rubio held an extensive press availability on the sidelines of the ASEAN summit in Manilla. During the questions the meeting with Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov was one of the key areas of focus.

Rubio noted the U.S. was still willing to play a positive and constructive role toward a ceasefire in Ukraine, with the intention of bringing an end to the hostilities and bloodshed. However, Rubio was not willing to discuss details of the private conversation with Lavrov.  WATCH:

[Transcript] – SECRETARY RUBIO: All right, what’s up?

QUESTION: Have you made any progress on Ukraine today? Is Russia serious about peace this time?

SECRETARY RUBIO: I mean, you think we settled the war in Ukraine in our 30 minutes here in Asia? That’s not the way it works. Look, we had a good conversation, a frank conversation. I’m not going to tell you what we talked about, because these – diplomacy doesn’t work well when you run to the microphones afterwards. Suffice it to say – I’ll tell you what I told you yesterday. The United States, the President’s been clear that we want – if we can, we are prepared to play a constructive role in bringing about an end to a senseless war. And we’re ready to do that, and we of course expressed that, and we’ve expressed it in other meetings. So we talked about other things as well.

QUESTION: Did you talk to him about Russia sharing information with Iran targeting U.S. troops?

SECRETARY RUBIO: Well, who says that they are?

QUESTION: Are they not?

SECRETARY RUBIO: Who says they are?

QUESTION: Hegseth acknowledged that Russia was enabling in some ways, both Russia and China.

SECRETARY RUBIO: Yeah, but that’s a different question from what you just asked me. Who said that they were – they’re doing that?

QUESTION: There’s been reporting that there’s – are you —

SECRETARY RUBIO: Reporting in the media?

QUESTION: Yeah.

SECRETARY RUBIO: Oh, then it must be true.

QUESTION: So is it not true?

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I have not written about the recent events in/around Ukraine because none of it makes sense and all of the information flows through the prism of ‘western’ intelligence propaganda.

According to Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskyy {SEE HERE}, he has removed and replaced the entire leadership apparatus of the Ukraine military.  This follows his removal of 35-year-old Mykhailo Fedorov from the defense ministry last week {CITATION} that led to massive protests against Zelenskyy and armed forces Chief Gen. Oleksandr Syrskiy, who was also eventually replaced.

As the story is told the young Defense Minister Mykailo Fedorov was very well regarded and was the person responsible for the successful technological advancements in military drone use.  35-year-old Fedorov was a close working partner with Palantir head Alex Karp who is assisting Ukraine in their drone development and deployment.

If the drone development and deployment was such a massive success, as pronounced in all western and Ukraine statements, then why would Zelenskyy remove such a critical and effective Defense Minister?  This makes no sense.

Additionally, if Chief General Oleksandr Syrskiy was such an effective combatant commander, and if Russia was indeed pushed back on their heels by both Syrskiy’s campaign and Fedorov’s drones, then why would Ukraine disrupt their entire military leadership apparatus while they are winning such well publicized victories.  Again, none of this makes sense.

These moves by President Zelenskyy are akin to President Trump firing Secretary Pete Hegseth and Joint Chiefs Chairman General Dan Caine, while saying they were doing an exceptional job on Operation Epic Fury in Iran.  See the problem?

None of these moves by Ukraine President Zelenskyy make any sense against the background story of them having incredible success against Russia.  You don’t replace the entire military leadership apparatus if things are going swimmingly.  However, it seems that no one in western media even fathoms the obvious conflicts in the narrative.

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