Who’s in Charge? Trump’s Ukraine Whiplash Leaves Europe Guessing

On Sunday, July 6th, Putin appeared at the “Everything for Victory” forum in Moscow. This forum is essentially an award ceremony for those participating in Russia’s war on Ukraine. The event is relatively new, having only been around for about a year, and is organized by the Russian Popular Front public movement, a coalition of groups that live and breathe Putin. The goal of both this forum and, really, the Popular Front itself is to drive up voluntary recruitment amid declining support. Meanwhile, Russia continued its strategy of unleashing waves of drones and missiles on Ukrainian cities, again mostly striking residential areas, even reemploying their double-tap strikes to ensure civilian casualties occur. It’s pretty obvious at this point what’s going on: Russia is attempting to break Ukrainian spirits while also lifting its own, because once again, they’ve failed to make any massive territorial gains in this recent offensive. Even on the battlefield, Ukraine managed gains near Borova. The fighting is a long way from being over, but Ukraine’s will to fight seems magnitudes larger than Russia’s.

On Monday, July 7th, there was a glimmer of hope, or maybe we will get another one of those “Fell for it again awards”, as the Trump administration began hinting that some of the paused U.S. military aid might resume. Upcoming meetings between Ukrainian Defense Minister Rustem Umerov and Trump’s envoy Keith Kellogg could lead to the release of engineering equipment and armored vehicles, though there’s no actual timeline, and no mention yet of the desperately needed Patriot air defense missiles. Trump confirmed to reporters that “more weapons” would be sent, claiming Ukraine is “getting hit very hard,” while conveniently ignoring that it was his Pentagon that halted those same deliveries last week, including over 8,000 shells, hundreds of precision munitions, and 30 Patriot missiles. Meanwhile, Zelenskyy called their recent phone call the “most productive” yet, in sharp contrast to Trump’s conversation with Putin, which he described as frustrating. Still, this pause is raising serious doubts among U.S. allies and even those here in the U.S., as it seems like no one is entirely sure who paused the weapons, according to Trump. Regardless, every day without those shipments going through costs Ukrainian lives.

Tuesday, July 8th, we gained a little more insight into exactly who paused the U.S. military aid to Ukraine, and it seems to have been none other than the Secretary of Drinking, Pete Hegseth. According to CNN, this pause in aid happened without even telling the White House. Even Trump was blindsided by the decision; he appeared legitimately confused, and when asked who had cleared the pause on weapons, he responded, “I don’t know, why don’t you tell me?” Clearly frustrated, and really, who can blame him? Hegseth didn’t tell Kellogg, didn’t tell Rubio, and he sure as hell didn’t tell Congress. Apparently, the man responsible for coordinating U.S. military strategy has no chief of staff and no senior advisors pushing him to loop in anyone on major national security decisions. Now, with Trump reversing this move by Hegseth, many, including myself, are left wondering if Hegseth will be ejected from the Trump orbit. Between the Houthi text chat debacle and now this, for once, Trump is entirely justified in firing one of his own officials.

On Wednesday, July 9th, it became clear that Europe doesn’t fully trust Trump’s sudden 180 on Ukraine, and honestly, that’s a good thing. No one should trust anything Trump publicly states; he’ll trash someone after one bad phone call, then flip the moment they offer the slightest praise. Europe can’t keep relying on the United States to do much of anything. Between Germany pulling back on Taurus missiles for Ukraine a few weeks ago and Poland seemingly softening its rhetoric, Europe is starting to look just as willing as Trump to sit back and hand the bill to someone else. Meanwhile, Elbridge Colby is leading a global posture review that may slash the U.S. troop presence in Europe altogether, something our allies are only finding out about from the press. Germany, Poland, and the U.K., all of them are being kept in the dark, and it’s creating serious tension. It’s no surprise, then, that allies see Hegseth as unreliable, possibly sidelined, and Colby as the one quietly gutting long-term deterrence.

Well, it only took a week of international embarrassment, internal chaos, and God knows how many dead civilians, but Trump finally decided to use his Presidential Drawdown Authority to send weapons to Ukraine. This is the first time in his second term he's used this emergency power, a tool Biden relied on constantly to keep Ukraine supplied, and it might finally signal that someone got through to him. The package could total around $300 million and might include long-awaited Patriot interceptors and GMLRS rockets, though nothing’s confirmed. What’s wild is that all the weapons Trump’s administration has sent so far were already approved by Biden. This marks a real shift, or at least the appearance of one. It doesn’t erase the damage from last week’s pause, but if these weapons actually get moving, they'll be on the front lines in days. Let’s just hope this isn’t another mood swing, and that the White House finally understands just how close to the edge they’ve pushed Ukraine.

On Friday, July 11th, Trump announced that the U.S. will begin selling Patriot missiles and interceptors to NATO, so that they can then give them to Ukraine. The process seems to me convoluted but there are some valid reasons for this, this means countries like Germany could begin gifting from their stockpiles now and purchase replacements from the U.S. speeding up the delivery process, now that's the good faith interpretation the bad faith one is that the United States is again attempting to distance itself from the conflict. Zelensky says Ukraine needs 10 Patriot systems. Meanwhile, drone warfare continues to evolve, with Kyiv investing $6.2 million in its Clean Sky program to boost domestic interceptor drone production. These drones are already downing dozens of Russian Shaheds nightly, though only U.S. Patriots can stop ballistic missiles. On the front lines, Russia’s goal to seize all of Donetsk by year’s end is looking increasingly delusional, with Ukraine’s GUR calling it “not realistic” and ISW estimating the current pace of Russian advances wouldn’t get them there until 2028. Despite this, though Russian assaults are unrelenting, from Sumy to Zaporizhia, Russian forces are attempting to push forward. Between the high casualties and minimal grounds gained, that whole attempt by Putin to drum up volunteers earlier in the week makes a lot more sense. 

Saturday, July 12th, Russia launched nearly 600 drones and 26 missiles overnight, killing civilians and hammering cities like Chernivtsi, Lviv, and Lutsk. Over 50 buildings were hit in Lviv alone, as Ukraine’s foreign minister condemned the strikes as another round of “terror” meant to exhaust Ukrainian defenses and morale. Meanwhile, Lavrov met with Kim Jong Un in North Korea, calling their alliance an “invincible fighting brotherhood” and using his stay in Pyongyang to repeatedly thank them for their troops’ involvement in Ukraine. It feels like just yesterday I was writing about North Korean troops in Ukraine and having to link videos as proof, while North Korea continued to deny their involvement in anything other than Kursk. Lavrov is now headed to China for the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) summit, signaling to the rest of the world that our enemies remain united while we are only just now getting back on the same page.