Vice President Kamala Harris is jetting to Europe Wednesday for a trip that became more complicated after one of her hosts — Poland — caught the United States by surprise with a proposal to provide its Soviet-era fighter jets to Ukraine.

The Polish government announced Tuesday that it was putting its fleet of MiG jets at American disposal to supply to Ukraine, an idea the US rejected out of hand. The White House was completely caught off guard by the Polish offer, according to people familiar with the matter, despite officials saying in the preceding days they’d been discussing options with their counterparts.

Harris will be tasked with smoothing over the situation as she arrives there late Wednesday on a mission to reassure one of NATO’s easternmost allies the United States remains committed to its security amid fresh worries about Russia’s intentions. The trip is the second time in a month that Harris has been dispatched to Europe as the Biden administration seeks to rally international support behind its efforts to isolate and punish Russia for the war in Ukraine.

The Senate on Tuesday passed sweeping bipartisan legislation to overhaul the US Postal Service’s finances and allow the agency to modernize its operations.

The final vote was overwhelmingly bipartisan 79-19. The bill now heads to President Joe Biden’s desk for his signature

The Postal Service Reform Act — which cleared the House last month by 342-92 — would require retired postal employees to enroll in Medicare when eligible, while dropping a previous mandate that forced the agency to cover its health care costs years in advance. Those two measures would save the USPS nearly $50 billion over the next decade, according to the House Oversight Committee. The legislation would also require the USPS to create an online dashboard with local and national delivery time data.

In 2014, Ukraine’s military was called “decrepit” by one national security analyst, and its navy was in “a sorry state.” Ukrainian General Victor Muzhenko, a former top commander of Ukraine’s armed forces, went as far to say that the military was “an army literally in ruins.”

Yet eight years later, after the Russian invasion that started on Feb. 24, 2022, the performance of Ukraine’s military has been surprisingly strong against the larger and better equipped Russian military.

The Ukrainians’ stiff resistance is the result of four significant factors.

The first two were the Ukrainian government’s committed effort in 2016 to reform its military, coupled with millions of dollars’ worth of Western aid and military equipment.

The third factor was important changes in Ukrainian military thinking that now allows for junior leaders to make battlefield decisions. Until recently, those leaders needed to seek permission to change orders given by commanders, regardless of whether changing battlefield conditions had rendered those orders irrelevant.

The last significant factor, arguably the most important, occurred among the Ukrainian people – a national culture of military volunteerism emerged. As a result, a government agency was created to organize and train civilians in defense against military attacks.

From 2016-2018, I helped Ukraine reform its defense establishment. During that time, I also conducted field research in Georgia to study the 2008 Russo-Georgian war. Based on that research, the Russian tactics used to invade Ukraine have not been surprising.

What has been surprising is the performance of the Ukrainian army.

Widespread defense reform

In 2014, the Ukrainian government launched a comprehensive review of its national security and military defense. The review identified a number of issues that directly resulted in poor combat performance.

The shortcomings ranged from an inability to fight cyberattacks to poor medical care delivery. Corruption was rampant, troops were not getting paid and basic supplies always ran low. Overall logistics and command were also inefficient.

To remedy these shortcomings, then-President Petro Poroshenko in 2016 directed sweeping reforms in five categories: command and control, planning, operations, medical and logistics, and professional development of the force.

It was an ambitious plan that set a goal for completion in only four years. A herculean effort under the best of circumstances, the Ukrainians at the time were fighting a war against Russian separatists in the Donbas.

What motivated Ukrainian officials and accelerated the reforms was a deep-seated fear that Russia might launch an invasion. Though all the reforms have not been implemented as yet, significant improvements have occurred over the last six years.

The evidence has been seen in response to the Russian invasion.

US military aid

To support Ukrainian military reforms, the U.S. increased its financial aid to Ukraine shortly after Russia’s illegal annexation of Crimea in 2014 and its support of separatists in Ukraine’s east.

In 2014, the Obama administration provided US$291 million in assistance, and by the end of 2021, the United States had given a total of $2.7 billion in training and equipment.

As part of this assistance, the United States helped train Ukrainian soldiers at the Yavoriv military base. The base quickly became a top-notch training center, where an estimated five battalions have trained annually since 2015.

In 2016, Poroshenko asked for senior defense advisers from the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, Lithuania and Germany to advise Ukraine on modernizing its armed forces with the goal of reaching NATO standards, rules and procedures by 2020.

One such NATO rule was a requirement for civilian control of the military; at the time, Ukraine’s minister of defense was also an active duty general. Another important NATO standard was insuring that Ukraine was able to integrate its logistical support with other NATO units when deployed.

Western support also included various weapons and equipment, including Humvees, drones, sniper rifles, radars that locate the origin of enemy fire and thermal scopes that are used to identify targets during the day or night.

One item of particular interest to the Ukrainians was obtaining better anti-tank missiles. When Russia sent T-90 tanks across the border to support separatists in 2014, Ukraine’s existing weapons were unable to penetrate the armor of T-90s.

In 2017, the United States provided the first set of Javelin anti-tank missiles to Ukraine.

Once the invasion became imminent, Western nations sent additional weapons and munitions to Ukraine, including Stinger missiles from Lithuania and Latvia, Javelin anti-tank missiles from Estonia and anti-tank missiles from the United Kingdom.

Battlefield decision-making

In 2014, Ukraine’s military culture discouraged risk-taking by junior leaders – the lieutenants and captains who were conducting the fighting on the ground. Unable to make decisions, junior leaders were required to seek permission before they could act, thus ruling out the possibility for what are called “disciplined initiatives.”

These initiatives occur when initial battlefield orders are no longer relevant or fit the changing situation. Given the speed, maneuverability and lethality of modern warfare, disciplined initiatives can be the difference between success and failure.

While fighting Russian-backed separatists and Russian forces in the Donbas in 2014, the Ukrainians quickly learned that lower-level leaders, such as platoon leaders and company commanders, could not wait for approval from a higher headquarters for every move. The speed of battle was simply too fast.

A new culture has emerged, and the Ukrainians are fighting now with a newer version of the ends justify the means: Outcomes are more important than processes.

This cultural shift, combined with eight years of fighting in the Donbas, has created a generation of combat-ready officers.

A nation of volunteers

Volunteers from across Ukraine flocked to the Donbas in 2014 to fight Russian-backed separatists. There were so many that entire volunteer battalions had to be created.

But there was little time for training. Volunteers were thrown into rapidly created units with mismatched camouflage uniforms and sent to the front with a hodgepodge of weapons.

Yet these volunteers bought time for Ukraine to mobilize and helped hold the line to prevent further Russian penetration deeper into Ukraine.

To remedy the problems in organizing the volunteer effort, Ukraine passed a law that took effect on Jan. 1, 2022. The law established a Territorial Defense Force as a stand-alone branch within the military. Some of these positions are for professional soldiers; others are reservists.

The force will include 10,000 career positions in peacetime and organize 120,000 reservists into 20 brigades.

Russia initiated its invasion before this force could be fully established, but it does, nonetheless, provide an organizing structure as the war continues.

Ukrainian resolve

Despite these reforms and Ukraine’s resistance to date, Russia’s war machine still dwarfs Ukraine’s.

A successful defense against Russia is a daunting challenge and will require resolve, something that Ukrainians have demonstrated repeatedly over the past eight years and in the opening days of the current war.

Based on my time there, the Ukrainians are proud, patriotic and prepared to do whatever is necessary to defend their nation.

A legal argument lurking in two Supreme Court cases could give Republican legislators in battleground states sweeping control over election procedures, with ramifications that could include power over how states select presidential electors.

Republicans from Pennsylvania and North Carolina challenged court-ordered redistricting plans in their states based on the “independent legislature” theory. It’s a reading of the Constitution, stemming from the 2000 election recount in Florida, that argues legislators have ultimate power over elections in their states and that state courts have a limited ability — or even none at all — to check it.

The Supreme Court turned away the GOP redistricting challenges on Monday, largely on procedural grounds. But at least four justices embraced the “independent legislature” theory to some degree, which would consolidate power over election administration in key states with GOP-dominated state legislatures, from the ability to draw district lines unchallenged to passing new restrictions on voting. Taken to its extreme, some proponents of the theory argue it would give legislators power to override the choice of presidential electors after voting in their states.

President Joe Biden is signing an executive order on government oversight of cryptocurrency that urges the Federal Reserve to explore whether the central bank should jump in and create its own digital currency.

The Biden administration views the explosive popularity of cryptocurrency as a call for acting with urgency to look at the risks and benefits of digital assets, said a senior administration official who previewed the order on the condition of anonymity.

As part of the order being signed Wednesday, the Treasury Department and other federal agencies are to study the impact of cryptocurrency on financial stability and national security.

The action comes as lawmakers and administration officials are increasingly voicing concern that Russia may be using cryptocurrency to avoid the impact of sanctions imposed on its banks, oligarchs and oil industry due to the invasion of Ukraine.

Last week, Democratic Sens. Elizabeth Warren, Mark Warner, and Jack Reed asked the Treasury Department to provide information on how it intends to inhibit cryptocurrency use for sanctions evasion.