I read a local article today (
source for Dutch speaking people (EDIT: clarified a bit) ) about Laura Cooper's testimony. It touches on something that somewhat went under the radar: how did the Ukranian system react to this situation?
A timeline (from last week) is interesting in this:
<early 2019>: the $391 million military aid to Ukraine is approved by congress
February 28 and May 23: officials are notified that the military aid will be released to Ukraine
July 3: Vindman finds out the money is actively withheld
July 10: meeting with Sondland, Mulvany and Bolton. The latter leaves the meeting furious, wanting "no part of whatever drug deal Sondland and Mulvaney are cooking up"
July 18: white house memo of a freeze on Ukraine military aid until further notice, based on presidential order
July 25: the infamous phone call between Trump and Zelenskiy
July 25 onward: worried Ukrainian calls to Cooper regarding the status of the aid
<somewhere in August>: a request by Ukrainians asking for the status
August 12: the formal whistleblower complaint is filed
August 28: politico publishes the freeze on the military aid
August 29: Ukrainian officials start banging on Taylor's door wanting to know details that Taylor at that point doesn't have
September 9: start of the democratic investigation
September 9: Trump/Sondland call wherein the former says he wants nothing from Ukraine ("no quid pro quo").
September 11: sudden release of the aid
(
mail source)
It's interesting to put things in chronological order, to say the least. Trump and his fan club always touted that it was the whistleblower that put things into motion, but from this, it looks like it was at best only a matter of time before this'd be public. I mean...Bolton's currently writing a book about his time in office, multiple Ukrainian officials were reaching out to find out why allocated money wasn't set up and it's not a given that politico based their publication on the whistleblower's report.
Republicans also claim that nothing is out of the ordinary (apart from a witch hunt), but in total nearly 400 million dollars in military aid is delayed for over half a year. Any moron can see that it would just be further delayed if it wasn't for these events.
EDIT: also interesting: according to Sondland, both Pompeo and Pence were also in the know about this entire ordeal. As far as Pompeo goes, it doesn't surprise me (I'm fairly sure - but I could be mistaken - that Giuliani also told the news he got his orders from both Trump and Pompeo). But Pence? That's honestly the first time I hear him being involved. I'm not rooting for him, but up until this point I just assumed he was, in fact, innocent in this entire ordeal.