Trump is drawing closer to Putin, but the CIA continues to support Kyiv. Ratcliffe’s resistance

‘Drones are falling from the sky,’ Ukrainian soldiers on the front line say as they try to explain what the restrictions on the flow of information from Starlink and Starshield mean to them. Some drones simply cannot fly: if they do not reach a certain speed, they are useless, and now there is an arbitrary speed limit imposed by it is not clear who – whether by the owner of the satellite constellation, Elon Musk; by the White House, and thus by Donald Trump; or by the Pentagon, and thus by Pete Hegseth. After a week of restrictions, Starlink and Starshield are still not functioning as they did before: at times they seem to have been restored, then they haven’t; reports overlap and contradict one another one after the other, but in the meantime many operations have been aborted, and much equipment has been lost (a unit of drone operators said that the drones falling from the sky were worth around one million dollars), the front line that had been stabilised by Ukrainian forces – who, in one sector near Lyman, were conducting Operation Vivaldi, an offensive that led to the recapture of more than 200 square kilometres of Russian-occupied territory – is now once again extremely uncertain.

None of the potential US decision-makers has taken responsibility for a decision that goes far beyond the withdrawal of financial and military aid: it is a hostile act towards Ukraine’s defence, and therefore an unprecedented gift to Vladimir Putin. Journalists, particularly those at the Wall Street Journal, have attempted to piece together the decision-making process; at present, it appears that Musk was the one who made the decision, although he was also the first to say: ‘It wasn’t me’, and that Trump rang him at some point telling him to restore satellite communications for Ukrainian soldiers. However, either Musk did not comply or Trump did not actually call, because full restoration had not taken place by the time these reports became public. Meanwhile, the Ukrainians’ trust has been shattered, fuelled by all the favours Trump has granted to Putin, the legitimisation of the Russian president and his humanitarian credentials, and the victims of this deadly about-turn. The only link with America that still holds – and thank goodness, for it is vitally important – is that with the CIA and its director, John Ratcliffe.

Shane Harris, a Pulitzer Prize-winning security affairs expert, has published an article in The Atlantic of the sort where every line contains something of interest. Harris has had numerous conversations with people in the know and has outlined the role of Ratcliffe and the CIA, “the agency that is at war with Russia even though Trump has been on friendly terms with Putin”. The U.S. intelligence community has not changed its mind or stance on the defense of Ukraine; it continues to lead personnel on the ground and, according to an agent from the Baltic states, the CIA’s operations today “are far more aggressive” than they were during the Biden administration. Ratcliffe is a very reserved director – the Ukrainians know he is caught between a fickle boss and the task of leading an agency that is essential to Ukraine’s existential war – but he has managed to bring the CIA back to the heart of the US intelligence community (he outlasted Tulsi Gabbard, for a start). Then there is Trump, of course, whose willingness or ability to listen fluctuates constantly, but Ratcliffe tends not to present himself as the decision-maker – a fact that often irritates the president – but rather to describe in detail the consequences of each operation: he is, writes Harris, like his predecessors, who in this Trumpian era, in which every role has been distorted, represent a saving continuity. The paradox, Harris writes, is that ‘the CIA’s success in Ukraine has become a problem, at least from Trump’s point of view’, because, thanks to intelligence, the Ukrainians are striking deep into Russian territory and targeting refineries – which the president, on the other hand, wants to safeguard. Ratcliffe is walking a tightrope: no one expects him to disobey an order from his president, but everyone is counting on him to persuade this hot-headed and unscrupulous Trump not to sever ties with the Ukrainian ally, which would be a disaster for the security of the entire West. The resistance of Ratcliffe and the CIA has become a matter of survival.