Trump’s Ex-Advisor Bolton: U.S. President Protracted Allocation Of Military Aid To Ukraine

United States National Security Advisor for President of the United States Donald Trump (2018-2019), John Bolton, wrote in his memoirs how President Trump protracted the allocation of military aid to Ukraine.

He writes this in his book, Ukrainian News Agency reports.

According to Bolton, United States Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, United States Secretary of Defense, Mark Esper, and he had made about 8-10 attempts to assure President Trump to approve allocation of the military aid to Ukraine.

It was important to do it before the end of the fiscal year (September 30).

However, President Trump linked the provision of the aid to the investigation regarding the servers of the Democratic Party and Ukrainian cases upon former vice president of the United States, Joseph Biden.

“August 20, I took Trump’s temperature on the Ukraine security assistance, and he said he wasn’t in favor of sending them anything until all the Russia-investigation materials related to Clinton and Biden had been turned over. That could take years, so it did not sound like there was much of a prospect that the military aid would proceed,” noted Bolton.

Another example described by him took place on August 30 when Bolton, who then was in Warsaw, was taking part in a video conference at the Situation took on the situation in Afghanistan.

At the end of the meeting, Bolton yelled at the screen: "Wait, what about Ukraine?"

Trump replied that NATO would have to pay for that aid.

"I don't give a shit about NATO. I am ready to say. If you don't pay, we won’t defend them," Trump said.

Bolton notes that the words clearly show Trump’s misunderstanding of the situation and mechanisms of the aid and notes that "there was nothing new there."

Trump also expressed his concern over the fact that the Ukraine’s situation hampered his agreement with Russia.

"Ukraine is a wall between us and Russia," he said, meaning, I think, a barrier to closer Moscow-Washington relations,” Bolton wrote.

He also writes that in Warsaw, apart from a meeting between President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and Vice President of the United States Mike Pence, there also was a meeting between U.S. Ambassador to the European Union, Gordon Sondland, and Zelenskyy’s advisor, Andrii Yermak, who discussed the Giuliani cases.

After his coming back to Washington, Pence was positive about the meeting with Zelenskyy and recommended that Trump approve the aid.

Trump did that in September after an exchange with hostages between Russia and Ukraine had taken place and seamen detained in the Kerch Strait had been released.

As Ukrainian News Agency earlier reported, the major aspect of the scandal related to a phase talk between Trump and Zelenskyy was the information that Trump demanded that Ukraine conduct an investigation into the cases against Hunter Biden (Joseph Biden’s son) in Ukraine in exchange for further cooperation.

Supporters of the Democratic Party considered the move as an attempt to use a foreign state in an election campaign.