Senate Republicans on Thursday accused the Biden administration of politicizing intelligence to cancel the transfer of jets from Poland to Ukraine as too dangerous.
During a hearing of the Senate Intelligence Committee, several Republicans challenged the administration for first agreeing to help transfer Polish MiG-29 jets to the Ukrainian military and then announcing the deal was off over fears it could spur Russia to expand the war to NATO.
Director of National Intelligence Avril Haines and Defense Intelligence Agency Director Lt. Gen. Scott Berrier defended the administration’s turnaround on the jet transfer.
“It is our analysts’ assessment that the transfer of these airplanes could be perceived as a significant escalation by the Russians,” Ms. Haines said of Warsaw’s offer.
The officials testified during an annual threat hearing that intelligence analysts reported that sending MiGs was too dangerous, but that providing U.S. Javelin anti-tank missiles and shoulder-fired anti-aircraft missiles was not as “escalatory.” Pentagon officials the Polish offer as structured was “not tenable.”
Sen. Richard Burr, North Carolina Republican, said the United States gave Poland a “green light” to send its MiG-29s, but Warsaw wanted to send the jets to a U.S. base and have Ukrainian pilots fly them from there. Suddenly, the transfer was rejected as too “escalatory” of the conflict, he said.
Approving Poland’s direct transfer but rejecting a U.S. role “was a policy decision made by the administration,” Mr. Burr said.
“I remind all of you at the table: Intelligence is never supposed to influence policy,” he said.
The senator said the committee expects intelligence officials to push back “if intelligence is being inappropriately used to reach a policy decision.”
“It is my hope is that we haven’t, as an intelligence community, put our finger on the scale of a policy decision that’s been made,” Mr. Burr said.
Ms. Haines said analytic objectivity is a core ethic for analysts. “I do not believe there is any issue here with respect to political or policy pressure being put on the analysts,” she said.
Analysts were asked whether or not providing the jets would be perceived by the Russians as an escalation by NATO of the conflict and they answered the question, she said.
Mr. Burr questioned why analysts would regard Poland’s direct transfer as safe but a U.S. transfer as dangerous.
Sen. Tom Cotton, Arkansas Republican, also said the administration used the intelligence data as a cover to quash the deal.
Mr. Cotton said he believed there was no new intelligence that was used to make the assessment that sending the jet would widen the war.
“This is opinion and, in many cases, this is policymakers that are looking to the intelligence community to provide them with cover for the hesitancy” to send arms, he said.
The Arkansas Republican also said the administration also may have misused intelligence in a bid to advance a renewed nuclear deal with Iran that is being brokered with Russian involvement in talks in Vienna.
“I have concerns that part of the reason the administration went relatively soft on Russia and was hesitant in Ukraine in 2021 was that they were relying on Russia to get the bad nuclear deal” with Iran, Mr. Cotton said.
Mr. Cotton said he did not believe there was intelligence to support the administration’s decision to cancel the jet transfer.
However, under questioning from Mr. Cotton, the DIA director acknowledged his agency made significant analytical mistakes, including underestimating the ferocity of Ukrainian resistance to the invasion.
“That was a bad assessment on my part,” he said.
The DIA also wrongly assessed that Russian forces would quickly overrun the country. “We made some assumptions about his assumption which proved to be very, very flawed,” Gen. Berrier said.
Ms. Haines said she believed intelligence analysts working for her office missed assessing the logistical and other problems now facing the Russian military in the war. Analysts, however, correctly gauged that Russian President Vladimir Putin would underestimate the intense level of Ukrainian resistance.
“These mistakes had potentially real-world policy implications about the willingness of the president and other NATO leaders to provide weapons that they thought might have fallen into the hands of Russians in a matter of hours,” Mr. Cotton said.
Sen. John Cornyn, Texas Republican, asked the intelligence leaders what they believed Russia would do in response to the transfer of Polish jets.
Gen. Berrier declined to comment in the committee’s open session.
Mr. Putin has used the threat of nuclear attacks as a way to deter NATO from intervening in the Ukraine operation, Mr. Haines said earlier this week.
The threats included large-scale nuclear exercises and missile launches prior to the invasion and the unusual public announcement by Mr. Putin that he had placed nuclear forces on higher alert.
• Mike Glenn can be reached at mglenn@washingtontimes.com.
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