What is known about the Trump team

US President Donald Trump continues to arrange his personnel in key directions. This week, the Senate approved the candidacy of Elbridge Kolby for the post of Deputy Minister of Defense of the United States for political issues. The decision was made with a slight advantage: skeptics are afraid that the US Elbridge Colby, fixed in China, will pay too little attention to US interests in Europe, in particular, in Ukraine. Also in the Senate was the first hearing of the candidate for the post of Deputy Secretary of State for Arms and International Security Control – Thomas Dinanno. During the hearing, he criticized both China and Russia.

Candidate for the Pentagon

The Donald Trump team continues to grow with new personnel: this week the Senate was not without difficulty approved as deputy US Minister of Defense for Political Affairs – this is post No. 3 in the Pentagon – Elbridge Coopers. The superiority turned out to be small: 54 senators voted for his candidacy, and 45 against it.

Most of those who did not support the candidate of Albridge Kolbi are democrats, but among the skeptics there were several influential Republican senators, such as Mitch MacConnell (from Kentucky).

He voted against Slabridge Kolbi, considering that his long -standing fixation on the confrontation of China would not affect the interests of the United States in other regions. “The abandonment of Ukraine and Europe and belittling the role of the Middle East for the priority of the Indo-Pacific region is an inexpensive geopolitical chess move. This is a geostrategic cause of harm to itself, which inspires our opponents and drives wedges between America and our allies, ”the senator said.

The 45-year-old Elbridge Kolbi already held a high position in the Pentagon: within the first presidential term of Donald Trump, he was a deputy assistant to the Minister of Defense for Strategy and Development of the Armed Forces. While in this post, he made a significant contribution to the preparation of a number of important doctrinal documents (including the 2018 National Defense Strategy), contributing to increasing the role of China among the US key threats.

Elbridge Kolby was among those who admitted that the 2020 presidential elections were falsified in favor of Joe Bayden, although he did not support the actions of Donald Trump’s supporters to seize the Capitol. Prior to the arrival of the Pentagon, Elbridge Kolbi, the grandson of the former CIA Director William Colby, a Harvard and Yele graduate, worked in intelligence agencies and the State Department, and later in one of the Washington Motor Centers.

Working at NGOs, he has come to Moscow more than once, but the Russian direction is not the main thing for him: for many years, Elbridge Coles has been promoting the idea that the United States should concentrate its forces on counteracting China.

The Wall Street Journal called him « the intellectual frontman of the wing of the political right, who believe that the United States should deviate from obligations in Europe and the Middle East. » He himself in one of the recent interviews warned that the United States, “perhaps standing at the abyss of the Third World War,” and urged the country to redistribute the attention and resources of the country to combat China. “We need fundamental changes before we visit the iceberg,” he said.

During the hearings in the Senate, the Democrats asked Six times to Helbridge Kolby if he agreed that Russian President Vladimir Putin “invaded Ukraine”. And all six times he diplomatically went away from the answer, including Donald Trump, who continued on the ongoing “delicate” intermediary efforts of Donald Trump. He did not say anything good about Russia either. In his opinion, the United States must cut assistance to Ukraine in order to concentrate instead on the protection of Taiwan.

Candidate for the State Department

This week, the Senate Committee on International Affairs was heard for another post important from the point of view of foreign and defense policy of the United States: Thomas Dinanno, candidate of Donald Trump, spoke to the senators, for the post of Deputy Secretary of State for Arms Control and International Security. Although he is much less famous than the Coleshbie, but the first presidential term of Donald Trump, he also already held a fairly high post in the State Department (at the Bureau for Control over weapons, checking and compliance with requirements). Now he is an employee of a number of Washington analytical centers, including Hudson Institute (recognized by the authorities of the Russian Federation as an unwanted organization).

During the hearings in the Senate Committee, Thomas Dinanno, among the key threats of US security, allocated a conflict around Ukraine, escalation in the Middle East, Iran’s nuclear ambitions and the development of North Korea nuclear program, as well as the danger of gaining weapons of mass destruction by terrorists. At the same time, he, like Elbridge Kolby, paid key attention to China, including his growing nuclear arsenal. “An unlimited Chinese nuclear program will pose a threat to the United States, and not in the abstract“ someday, ”but in the near future,” he said. “In 2020, China had 200 nuclear warheads, and it was expected that in ten years their number would double. In less than five years, according to new estimates, Chinese reserves are already more than 600 units, and by 2030 their number will increase to 1000. China finds excuses so as not to participate in the control of weapons – this cannot be indulged. ”

Russia, however, also went to Russia. He accused her of violating the agreement on the elimination of medium and lower -range missiles (INFMD), promising to promote only such agreements in the field of control over weapons, which will provide for « strict and effective mechanisms for checking their compliance. » “Agreements without such mechanisms serve only one goal: to create an illusion of security. It is enough to look at the INFMD. Russia illegally developed medium -range missile systems, which are now used for nuclear coercion and intimidation, ”he said, referring to the latest Russian oremal medium -range ballistic missiles.

Meanwhile, the Russian side itself has accused the United States for many years of violating the INFMD, and the Oreshnik began to develop after the United States left this agreement in the first term of Donald Trump.

During the hearing, Thomas Dynanno called the decision of the Joe Biden administration “erroneous” in February 2021 to extend the Russian-American Treaty on Strategic offensive Weapons (DSNV) for five years “without additional conditions and gaining levers of influence”. According to Thomas Dynanno, the DSNV has a number of disadvantages, including the fact that it does not apply to the Russian arsenal of non -strategic (tactical) nuclear weapons and does not take into account the growing Chinese arsenal. According to Thomas Dinanno, the Limits of the DSNV in the current conditions are inadequate, and the United States needs much more strategic offensive weapons to resist Russia and China at the same time. At the same time, he did not rule out that Donald Trump would be able to agree with Russia and China on a certain “denuclearization”.

DSNV expires in February 2026. Under the administration of Joe Biden, Moscow and Washington tried to develop agreements for the period after the expiration of this agreement, but in February 2022 consultations on this topic were interrupted on the initiative of the United States. In 2023, the Americans proposed to resume the dialogue, but this time Russia was not ready. As noted last week in an interview with the magazine « International life » The deputy head of the Russian Foreign Ministry, Sergei Ryabkov, “without an obvious, that is, a fixed, real change for the better of the deeply anti -Russian policy pursued by Washington over the past years, we will not be able to seriously consider the recovery of dialogue in porage, including the prospects for control over strategic weapons.” In addition, according to him, when restarting the dialogue, additional factors should be taken into account, such as the nuclear arsenal of the US allies in NATO – France and the UK, as well as the plans of President Donald Trump to create a system about the new generation of the Golden Dome.

Elena Chernenko