According to the New York Times, when pro-Ukrainian CIA and U.S. military personnel were frustrated that U.S. President Donald Trump seemed unwilling to impose more sanctions on Russia, they secretly “searched for other ways to choke off the Russian war economy.”
“Mr. Trump had allowed these officers to continue providing intelligence to the Ukrainians for drone strikes on crucial components of the Russian defense industrial base, including oil refineries. Early efforts had been disorganized, with little impact. But after a CIA expert identified the refineries’ Achilles’ heel—a coupler that, if destroyed, would keep a refinery offline for weeks—the drone campaign would take off. According to one U.S. intelligence estimate, the energy strikes would cost the Russian economy as much as $75 million a day.”
One might ask if the President had “allowed” them to do it, why the Times characterized it as secret, and one might also ask whether Trump authorized the CIA to “assist” with the Ukrainian drone strikes on the Russian fleet.
