Five former intelligence and national security officials say that the CIA is training elite Ukrainian special operations forces in the U.S. The program is based in the Southern U.S., according to some of the officials.
Russian troops have massed in what many fear is preparation for an invasion, and the CIA-trained forces could soon play a critical role. The U.S. and Russia have failed to reach an agreement so far.
Ukrainian troops walk in a trench on the frontline with Russia-backed rebels near Avdiivka. A picture of Anatolii Stepanov/AFP.
The Ground Department, a covert program run by paramilitary groups for the CIA, was established by the Obama administration after Russia's invasion and annexation of Crimea in 2014, but has been further augmented by the Biden administration.
The CIA Ground Branch began to travel to the front in eastern Ukraine in 2015, as part of the anti-Russia effort.
According to former officials, the multiweek CIA program has included training in firearms, camouflage techniques, land navigation, tactics and intelligence.
There is a dispute over how to describe the program. The U.S. has debated whether to provide military assistance to Ukraine, and how much, with discussions often focusing on whether that help is offensive or defensive in character.
The CIA training program is not offensive, according to U.S. officials. A current senior intelligence official said that the purpose of the training was to assist in the collection of intelligence.
Intelligence support can be ambiguous in the paramilitary context. The facts on the ground may change quickly how this training will be applied by the Ukrainians.
The Ukrainian Territorial Defense Forces are taking part in a military exercise in December of 2021. Sergei Supinsky is pictured.
The former senior intelligence official said that the program involved training on skills that would enhance the Ukrainians ability to push back against the Russians.
The former official said that the training is going to start looking pretty offensive if Russians invade Ukraine.
A person familiar with the program said it was bluntly. A former CIA official said that the US is training an insurgency and teaching the Ukrainians how to kill Russians.
The training that could be used for that purpose was included in the program. A former agency official said technical aspects of the program, like showing Ukrainians how to maintain secure communications behind enemy lines, could be a potential stay-behind force training.
The current senior intelligence official denied that the program was designed to assist in an insurgency.
Tammy Thorp, a CIA spokeswoman, said that suggestions that the CIA has trained an armed insurgency in Ukraine are false.
The CIA has provided limited training to Ukrainian intelligence units in the past, but cooperation increased after the annexation of the peninsula, according to a former CIA executive.
The self-proclaimed Luhansk People's Republic walked at a fighting position on the line of separation from the Ukrainian armed forces near the settlement of Frunze in Luhansk Region. Alexander Ermochenko is a reporter for the Associated Press.
The former agency executive said that the CIA has a small footprint in the country and that they are helping train the Ukrainians.
The former senior intelligence official said that the U.S.-based training program has been a high priority for the CIA since its inception.
According to former officials, the program did not require a new presidential finding, which is used to authorize covert action, and has been run under previously existing authorities.
The Trump administration expanded funding for the initiative at the urging of Congress, increasing the number of Ukrainians brought over annually to the U.S., according to former officials.
Training forces that could take part in an insurgency is not the same as actively supporting an insurgency after a Russian invasion. A task force has been formed by the Biden administration to figure out how the CIA and other US agencies could support a Ukrainian rebellion.
The former senior intelligence official said that graduates of the CIA programs would be your militia if the Russians invaded. We have been training these guys for eight years. They are really good fighters. That could be where the program has a serious impact.
The former CIA executive said that the CIA training programs have been effective over the years.
The first former CIA official who was briefed about the program said it helped turn the tide.
The celebrations on the occasion of the 5th anniversary of the National Guard of Ukraine were held in the city of Kyiv. Maxym Marusenko/Nur Photo via Wikimedia Commons.
According to former U.S. officials, both the U.S. and Ukrainian governments believe that Ukrainian forces will not be able to hold back a large-scale Russian incursion. According to former officials, representatives from both countries believe that Russia won't be able to hold on to new territory indefinitely because of stiff resistance from the Ukrainians.
Former officials say that working so closely with the Ukrainians has presented unique challenges. The US believes that the program has been compromised by Russia because of its web of spies within the Ukrainian intelligence services.
A former national security official said that senior Trump administration officials discussed Russian penetration of the program with their Ukrainian counterparts. The Ukrainians tried to vet the U.S.-bound trainees to make sure they were not moles.
The former national security official said that the rule not to tell the Ukrainians anything they weren't comfortable with was established by the National Security Council.
The first former CIA official said that a small number of people in the U.S.-based cohort were sent back to Ukraine for breaking security rules.
The CIA believed that their trainees were being targeted by the Russians. The former CIA official said that the Ukrainian security services were being sought out by Russian loyalists to assassinate graduates.
Military intelligence and forensic police examine the wreck of a car. The commander of the military intelligence special ops unit of the Ukrainian military was killed by a bomb in central Kyiv. The Pacific Press and LightRocket are pictured.
According to former intelligence officials, Russian penetration of Ukrainian intelligence has been a problem for the CIA. For decades, the agency has tried to work only with special select Ukrainian units that have been isolated from the rest of the country's intelligence services in order to prevent Russian compromise, according to former officials.
According to former officials, the CIA still believes the training program is highly valuable even though it assumes some Russian compromise.
The former senior intelligence official said that if the Russians launched a new invasion, there would be people who would make their life miserable. The CIA-trained paramilitaries will organize the resistance.
The former senior intelligence official said that they can expect to see that in spades with these guys.
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