The information reportedly comes from a “sensitive but unclassified” US State Department cable obtained by the press on Wednesday. The cable was sent by Bridge Brink, the US ambassador to Ukraine, to the desk of her boss, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken.
According to the document, the skeleton staff at the embassy is just 106 US personnel and 250 Ukrainians, more than half of whom are working in security-related roles, “leaving a small core group to advance diplomacy, manage foreign assistance programs, and oversee operations,” the cable said. It did not include information about the facility’s optimal staffing numbers.
The plans are subject to future developments in the conflict between Ukraine and Russia, which is nearing the one-year mark later this month.
As Russia-NATO tensions reached fever pitch in February 2022, just two weeks before Russia launched its special operation to remove the threat of Ukraine serving as a base for NATO offensive weapons, the US announced it was moving its embassy from the Ukrainian capital of Kiev to the western city of Lvov, the furthest major city from the Russian border.
After the conflict started, the Kiev embassy remained closed until May, when it reopened. News reports at the time indicated Washington was considering deploying US Special Forces troops to defend the embassy in the capital city, which had been threatened by a Russian feint early-on and continued to be struck by Russian cruise missiles.
A State Department spokesperson anonymously told US media that Blinken had “championed” the effort to return to the Kiev facility “at the earliest possible date.”
Also of note in the document is a warning for department staff to keep a close eye on how the massive volume of US aid to Ukraine is being distributed to avoid a harmful “scandal or misstep.”