Pentagon’s high-level group to aid Ukraine is rooted in Iraq and Afghanistan fight – By Joe Gould (Defense News) / May 17, 2022
WASHINGTON ― The Pentagon has modeled a new high-level team focused on rushing military aid to Ukraine on the group it used to speed supplies to troops in Afghanistan, Iraq and Syria, according to a memo obtained by Defense News and sources familiar with the matter.
Pentagon leaders several weeks ago quietly convened the group ― co-chaired by the Pentagon’s No. 2 civilian and military leaders ― to cut through its notoriously unwieldy bureaucracy. Called the Senior Integration Group-Ukraine, its mandate is to hustle military equipment to Ukraine from its own stocks, replenish those stocks, coordinate aid with NATO, support partner nations and address humanitarian issues.
The SIG-Ukraine is adapted from the little known Warfighter Senior Integration Group, which the Pentagon launched in the middle of the war on terror to answer the urgent needs of battlefield commanders. The Ukraine group’s predecessor rapidly fielded surveillance aerostats, working dogs and ballistic underwear used to protect troops from roadside bombs and much more, according to former officials.
“Effective immediately, I am establishing a Senior Integration Group-Ukraine (SIG-Ukraine), to focus on facilitating the provision of lethal and non-lethal support to enable Ukraine to more effectively defend itself against Russian aggression,” Deputy Defense Secretary Kathleen Hicks, one of the group’s co-chairs, said in her May 11 memo authorizing the group, which was already at work.
