As tensions mount in Eastern Europe amid questions about whether Russian President Vladimir Putin will order an invasion of Ukraine, a new poll has found that Americans don’t have much of an appetite to go to war to defend the former Soviet Republic, with a vast majority saying U.S. leaders should focus their attention on domestic issues.
According to a survey conducted by YouGov in conjunction with the Charles Koch Institute that was released on Friday, a plurality of Americans (48 percent) said they either strongly or somewhat oppose “going to war with Russia to protect Ukraine’s territorial integrity” should Russia invade. Just 27 percent favored such a move while 24 percent said they didn’t know.
Meanwhile, 73 percent agreed that the United States “should prioritize domestic issues over foreign policy issues,” and just 7 percent agreed that foreign policy should take precedence.
The poll also found little enthusiasm for increasing the U.S. military presence around the world, with 40 percent saying the United States should be less engaged, while 32 percent said it should remain about the same.
Ben Armbruster is the Managing Editor of Responsible Statecraft. He has more than a decade of experience working at the intersection of politics, foreign policy, and media. Ben previously held senior editorial and management positions at Media Matters, ThinkProgress, ReThink Media, and Win Without War.
The Bunker appears originally at the Project on Government Oversight and is republished here with permission.
A pair of stories with contrasting narratives
It was the best of times (“We blew Iran’s nuclear-weapons complex to smithereens!”), it was the worst of times (“Psst — we’re submitting a proposed defense budget for next year even smaller than this year’s”). That’s why last Thursday there was an 8 a.m. all-hands-on-deck for a rare press conference (only the second in five months) by Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth. And a mere peep later in the day about his proposed 2026 budget.
This is performance politics worthy of the Wallendas. President Donald Trump can declare that the U.S. “completely and totally obliterated” Tehran’s atomic enterprise to bits even before the B-2 bombers that carried it out had returned to their home base in Missouri. Unfortunately, skeptical Pentagon intelligence analysts cast doubts on that certitude. That’s their job. Predictably, Trump came down on the Pentagon reporters who relayed the views of the Defense Intelligence Agency like a petulant kindergarten bully. He predictably commanded that his sidekick — that would be the SECDEF — denounce the doubters.
Which he did with a relish that is decidedly unappetizing: “You cheer against Trump so hard, it’s like in your DNA and in your blood to cheer against Trump because you want him not to be successful so bad, you have to cheer against the efficacy of these strikes.”
Let’s be clear — neither side’s assessment was rock-solid. It’s simply too early to tell. Trump shouldn’t have issued his “completely” claim so soon. And reporters should have treated more gingerly that initial DIA bomb-damage assessment, which apparently turned out to be a “low confidence” worst-case projection.
Just because Trump jumped the gun is no reason for reporters to follow suit.
The same day, the Pentagon rolled out its 2026 budget request seeking $848 billion. That’s actually lower than this year’s $831 billion, when taking inflation into account. Trump’s pledge to spend $1 trillion on defense next year will only happen if Congress approves a $113 billion add-on now under debate. Toting up all administration-wished-for 2026 national-security spending, including that one-time bonus, plus that spent on nuclear weapons by the Energy Department, the total rises — surprise! — to $1.01 trillion. But where such future annual $100 billion plus-ups will come from remains unknown, and unknowable.
Unlike publicly pummeling the press, the Defense Department’s budget unveiling was a decidedly low-key affair. “The announcement was a stark departure from past budget roll-outs, which have traditionally included an overview briefing by the Pentagon’s comptroller, and sometimes the deputy defense secretary and vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, followed by separate briefings by each military department,” Meghann Myers pointed out at Defense One. That’s probably because the Pentagon finds itself too embarrassed to confess to the budgetary sleight-of-math required to reach Trump’s trillion-dollar target.
War of the words
Trump has been ruminating again about returning the Department of Defense to its original name: the Department of War. The Bunker, dedicated to ending decades of defense opacity (“obscurity of sense”) and obfuscation (“to be evasive, unclear, or confusing”), is all for the change.
The U.S. long had a War Department (largely the Army and, later, its fledgling air force) and a Navy Department. But as the threat posed by the Soviet Union grew, Congress combined them and created the National Military Establishment in 1947, along with the Air Force. There was just one problem. The U.S. military loves its acronyms, and the new “NME” acronym sounded too much like “enemy.” So, in 1949, the Department of Defense was born.
The name change has arguably led to an expansive and flabby understanding of the role of the nation’s military. The Lycra-like label has been stretched to cover humanitarian ops, mission creep, nation-building, and forever-rising budgets. In contrast, a cabinet agency laser-focused on waging war could lead to a leaner, cheaper force. And that might not be the only change. The Bunker’s home, here at the Center for Defense Information at the Project On Government Oversight, would also face a tough choice. “Does CDI,” POGO pooh-bah Scott Amey ponders, “become the Center for War Information?”
Varmints pester Air Force base
North Dakota’s Minot Air Force Base, home to nuclear-capable B-52 bombers, is being invaded by growing burrowing brigades of what the locals call dakrats (short for Dakota rat), a type of ground squirrel. “A team of Air Force subject matter experts and representatives from Minot AFB Homes are meeting regularly to coordinate a more active response,” the base posted on its Facebook page June 23. Residents “can continue to use traps in their backyard,” but reinforcements are on the way. The base plans to roll out “a more comprehensive trapping plan” soon, and pledges “increased resourcing for fall and spring mitigation efforts to significantly decrease the on-base [dakrat] population.”
This is not a new problem. “Since the removal of their natural predators on base,” a 2019 Air Force story noted, “their population has significantly increased in numbers, causing damages to mission-essential infrastructure and homes across the base.” The base’s estimated 10,000+ dakrats were “degrading runways, platforms, foundations, and housing.” Deploying gas, other poisons, flooding, and trapping plainly didn’t lead to their complete and total obliteration.
Commenters responding to the base’s post on the latest vermin surge had their own suggestions on how to get rid of the critters. They ranged from bubble gum (Bazooka Joe brand, The Bunker presumes), to “bad donut dough,” to A-10 attack planes, to B-2 bombers. “Trap a few and microchip them to track to the colony,” one recommended, “then use a bunker-buster.”
Congress wants the Pentagon to build an ammunition plant in the Philippines to deal with the threat posted by China, USNI News’ Aaron Matthew Lariosa reported June 24.
The Pentagon has changed the name of the USNS Harvey Milk, named for the assassinated gay-rights activist, to the USNS Oscar V. Peterson, a sailor posthumously awarded the Medal of Honor for saving his stricken vessel during World War II, Riley Ceder reported June 27 in Navy Times.
The Air Force is diverting money from its new and troubled $141 billion Sentinel ICBM program to refurbish that Qatari 747 that President Trump plans to use as Air Force One, Rachel S. Cohen reported June 27 in Air & Space Forces Magazine.
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Top photo credit: Brett McGurk (Kuhlmann /MSC/Wikimedia Commons) and Lloyd Austin ((DoD Photo by U.S. Air Force Staff Sgt. Jack Sanders).
In 2021, Ret. Gen. Lloyd Austin declared he had “no intent to be a lobbyist.” On June 3, less than six months after leaving office, former President Joe Biden’s Secretary of Defense announced that he would be launching a new strategic advisory firm called “Clarion Strategies.” Some Senators allege this is simply lobbying by another name.
A pitch deck obtained by Politico noted that Clarion Strategies’ name is a “nod to its aim to equip clients with the clarity they need to navigate geopolitical upheaval driven by the war in Ukraine, advancements in defense technology like AI and unmanned systems, global trade shifts and emerging alliances among U.S. adversaries like Russia, China, North Korea and China.” In other words, the new firm is very much hoping to court clients from the defense industry.
It won’t have too much trouble — Clarion Strategies is equipped with an all-star roster of Biden administration officials that, in addition to Austin, includes former Secretary of Veterans Affairs Denis McDonough, former Assistant Secretary of Defense for Indo-Pacific Security Affairs Ely Ratner, and former U.S. Permanent Representative to NATO Julianne Smith.
The news troubled two members of the Senate Armed Services Committee, Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) and Rick Scott (R-Fla.), enough to write Austin a letter on June 30 voicing their "serious questions" about how decisions he made in office "may have benefitted the defense contractors and other companies that may now be [his] clients.”
There is a cooling-off period that prohibits executive branch officials — typically either one or two years depending on seniority — from directly lobbying their former agencies. However, Warren noted that “Austin appears to have found a loophole by serving as an ‘adviser’ rather than a registered lobbyist.” This loophole, known as the “strategic consulting loophole,” allows some former officials to avoid waiting until the cool-down period for lobbying activities is over simply by serving as an “advisor,” meaning they can still coordinate campaigns and advise lobbyists.
As long as Secretary Austin doesn’t engage in direct lobbying, he is cleared to work for any military contractor that comes knocking.
Warren and Scott denounced Austin for reneging on his 2021 promise by invoking this loophole and demanded that his new firm disclose a list of clients and contracts. “We ask that you reconsider your actions," they wrote. "If you are unwilling to do that, you should at least provide transparency to the public about your new role.”
President Biden tried to crack down on this kind of shadow lobbying, barring certain senior officials such as Secretary Austin from this loophole. However, Trump revoked this executive order on Day One of his second term. For all of Trump’s lambasting on the campaign trail of the revolving door as a “big problem”, his decision to revoke the ethics rules helped Biden administration officials race to lucrative private sector gigs in record time. “It really does a huge favor for Biden administration political appointees,” Rob Kelner, a partner at the Covington & Burling law (and lobbying) firm, told Politico.
Craig Holman, Public Citizen’s Capitol Hill lobbyist on ethics, lobbying, and campaign finance rules, explained in an email to RS that revoking the rules forces the system to rely on weaker, preexisting revolving-door restrictions, which have no limitations on “strategic consulting.” If anything, Holman said, “the law encourages this form of shadow lobbying.”
Several other Biden defense policy officials are following in Austin’s footsteps and working for strategic advisory firms.
Faiq Raza, the Biden Pentagon’s Capitol Hill liaison for acquisition affairs is now a senior adviser to The Roosevelt Group, a consulting firm with noted expertise in defense, military installations, and the appropriations process. According to OpenSecrets, the group currently has nine clients in the defense sector, including Airbus and RTX (formerly known as Raytheon). Biden’s Army Acquisition Chief Doug Bush founded his own consulting firm, DRB Strategies. After four years of leading Army acquisitions, Bush’s new firm deals in government contracting, acquisitions, and “legislative strategies for companies focused on national security.”
“One could only hope that former Biden officials sincerely believed in the revolving door restrictions that they signed on to and would voluntarily live by those principles,” said Holman. “But the new consulting positions of former Secretary Austin and others suggest that is not the case.”
Other Biden defense officials are getting more creative, working for venture capitalists and banks with close ties to the defense industry.
Less than two months after leaving office, Austin’s former chief of staff, Derek Chollet, was tapped by JPMorganChase to lead the bank’s new Center for Geopolitics. According to the advisory unit’s website, the Center aims to help the bank’s clients respond to the shifting geopolitical landscape “through events, webinars, calls, in-person small groups, and one-on-one conversations.”
The Center’s inaugural report, signed by Chollet, highlighted the need to rapidly rebuild, modernize, and expand the U.S. defense industrial base in order to maintain strategic influence internationally. The report specifically argued that such efforts require a larger defense budget and the creation of multi-year procurement packages for weapons such as HIMARS and PAC-3 interceptor missiles. These weapons are built by a client of JPMorgan Chase Bank, Lockheed Martin, which enjoys a lending agreement with the bank worth $3.5 billion.
Brett McGurk, Biden’s top Middle East advisor, waited only three weeks after leaving the Biden administration to join Lux Capital as a Venture Partner. Lux Capital is a venture capital firm invested in defense technology companies such as Anduril, which specializes in autonomous weapons. In its announcement, Lux gushed that McGurk’s “unique combination of diplomatic experience and forging strategic partnerships are [sic] invaluable, as we continue to back founders building transformative companies that are reshaping the world.”
McGurk’s stature also landed him a CNN Global Affairs Analyst position, where he is simply introduced as “Former White House Coordinator for the Middle East and North Africa,” leaving out his new role at Lux. During the last few weeks, McGurk used his CNN platform to make the case for bombing Iran. “So if [you] want to destroy Fordow — and at the end of this I think Fordow has to be taken care of either diplomatically or through a military strike — it really is the U.S. military option.”
In case there was any doubt to where Lux’s interests lie, the venture capital firm’s co-founder Josh Wolfe said on X he hopes for the “day we can make our first Lux investments in a free + open Iran.”
Lastly, some Biden defense officials have opted to simply cut out any middleman and are already working directly for Pentagon contractors.
In May, Aerospace Corporation, selected two top Biden Pentagon officials to serve on its board of trustees — Bill LaPlante, the former Under Secretary of Defense for Acquisition and Sustainment, and Frank Calvelli, Assistant Secretary of the Air Force for Space Acquisition and Integration. In June, former undersecretary of the Army Gabe Camarillo leveraged his experience into a Senior Vice President of Defense Technology Solutions position at KBR — a notable army contractor — overseeing a $2 billion budget to support “land, sea, air and cyberspace defense capabilities for the Department of Defense, UK Ministry of Defence, and Australian Defence Force.”
And just last week, Heidi Shyu, the Biden administration’s Under Secretary of Defense for Research and Engineering, joined the board of Areté, a cyberdefense firm that currently holds contracts with the Navy and the Defense Intelligence Agency.
With Biden’s Pentagon racing through the revolving door at breakneck speed, the list goes on and on. Whether it’s an advisory firm engaging in shadow lobbying, a venture capital firm, or even a Pentagon contractor, it’s dealer’s choice.
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Top photo credit: U.S. President Donald Trump and Keith Kellogg (now Trump's Ukraine envoy) in 2017. REUTERS/Kevin Lamarque TPX IMAGES OF THE DAY
Last week, Russian military forces seized a valuable lithium field in the Donetsk region of Ukraine, the latest success of Moscow’s grinding summer offensive.
The lithium deposit in question is considered rather small by industry analysts, but is said to be a desirable prize nonetheless due to the concentration and high-quality of its ore. In other words, it is just the kind of asset that the Trump administration seemed eager to exploit when it signed its much heralded minerals agreement with Ukraine earlier this year.
The response from Washington? Crickets. The loss attracted no notable reaction from President Donald Trump or his advisers. Ukraine and its backers, who had hoped that the deal would create an abiding and long-term U.S. interest in Ukraine and its security future, will certainly be disappointed.
Despite receiving almost no attention in the United States, however, the episode offers three important insights into the state of the war and the prospects for peace in the near-term.
First, the setback is a clear reminder that time is not on Ukraine’s side. Pressing on with the war is not likely to improve Kyiv’s battlefield or negotiating position. The Trump administration on Tuesday just ordered a halt on military assistance, the last of the aid packages initiated under the Biden administration will arrive. Ukraine’s army is already running short on air-defense missiles to protect its cities from punishing Russian drone and missile attacks, and the end of U.S. aid could trigger military shortages in other areas.
Add to this concerns about high desertion rates among exhausted Ukrainian soldiers and things aren’t likely to turn around soon for the beleaguered U.S. partner.
There are still voices pushing Ukraine to fight on, arguing that Russia is on the brink of collapse and that with just a little more military assistance from Europe and the United States, Ukraine has a chance at victory. But this is wishful thinking. Putin has staked too much on Ukraine to back down now and believes Russia has the ability to absorb additional pain and more fighting if necessary. Ukraine, on the other hand, continues to steadily lose territory, and with it, valuable resources and economic capacity that could support its reconstruction.
By extending the fighting, Kyiv is gambling away Ukraine’s post-war future. The sooner the war ends, the better the terms of the deal are likely to be for Ukraine.
Second, the non-existent U.S. response is emblematic of the very low ranking Ukraine and its war currently hold on Trump’s list of priorities. When Trump returned to the White House, the biggest fear of Ukraine’s supporters was that he would force Ukraine into an effective surrender, giving Russia the spoils. Despite significant tension between Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and Trump, manifested in a disastrous Oval Office meeting in late February, this did not happen.
Now, however, Kyiv and its supporters have a new concern: Trump has lost interest in Ukraine almost entirely. Trump was already frustrated with flailing efforts to reach a peace agreement in the three-year old conflict before two weeks of crisis in the Middle East wiped Ukraine off the White House’s radar. Trump skipped his meeting with Zelensky by departing the G-7 conference in Canada early, and, although the two did meet on the sidelines of the NATO summit a week later, Ukraine’s war was noticeably left off the summit’s agenda, in no small part to avoid surfacing disagreements between the United States and NATO allies on the issue. There has been no talk of extending new U.S. military aid packages to Ukraine, and even Ukrainian offers to buy U.S. weapons have been met with limited enthusiasm.
At this point, despite periodic Truth Social posts, Trump seems content to let Ukraine and Russia keep fighting until they come to settlement terms on their own. This is not a bad result for Russia which has momentum on the battlefield or for the United States which has no real strategic interest in Ukraine. But it leaves Kyiv at a disadvantage and is, moreover, exactly the outcome that the minerals deal was supposed to prevent.
The deal’s failure to maintain Trump’s support and interest in Ukraine should not be a surprise. It is a weak agreement with uncertain terms, signed by a president more interested in making deals than sticking to them. But the U.S. non-response should underscore for Kyiv that it is on its own going forward. Empty deals and more pleading will not resurrect U.S. interest and support for Ukraine. Europe can fill some of the gap left by U.S. disengagement, but for the most part, Ukraine’s future security will now be in its own hands.
Finally, Ukraine’s many disadvantages, combined with growing U.S. disinterest, suggest that the timeline for peace now rests largely with Putin. Though Russia’s progress on the battlefield is slow and costly in terms of materiel and human lives, Moscow’s army continues to press forward, capitalizing on weak spots along Ukraine’s lines and steadily gaining valuable territory, including economic and natural resources.
Meanwhile, Russia’s repeated missile and drone strikes on Ukraine’s cities are more confirmation that Putin is not tiring of the war just yet and intends to press his advantage.
There is little that Europe or the United States can do to change this calculus, even if Trump were interested in trying to strongarm Putin into a ceasefire. Additional sanctions are unlikely to force Putin to back down, and limits on Western defense production will constrain what can be offered to Ukraine in terms of additional military aid. Ukraine, itself, has few cards to play. High-risk military gambits by Kyiv, such as Operation Spiderweb, may impose costs on Moscow, but will not be sufficient to soften Putin’s resolve.
But while Putin may be in the driver’s seat right now, he too will be ready to stop fighting at some point, perhaps even when the current offensive runs out of steam later this fall. And though it makes sense for Trump and his advisors to step back from their day-to-day engagement with Ukraine and its war for now, they would be smart to take some low-cost steps to ensure that if and when a window for talks opens, they are ready to take advantage of it.
First, the Trump administration should resume bilateral meetings between U.S. and Russian officials, similar to those held in Riyadh earlier this year. Strengthening this communication channel now will make it easier to hold productive and substantive discussions later on, even if the topics covered over the next few months are superficial only.
Second, Trump should encourage Russia and Ukraine to continue and even increase the frequency of their direct dialogue. Ultimately, any lasting deal will need to have support from the two combatants, so these face-to-face talks will be essential to any effort to reach a peace agreement.
Finally, Washington will need to get Europe on board with a push for peace. This has been hard in the past, with Europe’s leaders acting primarily as an impediment to efforts to end the war. The recent NATO summit, however, showed just how much leverage the current White House still has over a European continent terrified of abandonment. The Trump team should not be afraid to use its upper hand, to compel Europe ahead of time to get behind any peace deal Ukraine, Russia, and the United States agree to.
It attracted little notice, but Russia’s capture of a Ukrainian lithium reserve in the country’s eastern reaches and the Trump team’s muted reaction actually speaks volumes about the state of the Ukraine-Russia war. With Ukraine on the ropes and the United States focused elsewhere, Putin seems in command of the war’s tempo. The near term prospects for peace are slim, but bigger opportunities for peace may lie ahead, especially if Washington sets some of the groundwork now.
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