WASHINGTON — This was a trainwreck.
A US Army general tasked with coordinating military support for war-torn Ukraine lost track of classified maps while traveling by train across Europe in the spring of 2024, according to a scathing watchdog report released last week.
Maj. Gen. Antonio Aguto, who helmed the Germany-based Security Assistance Group-Ukraine between December 2022 and August 2024, entrusted the maps to his staff while returning to Germany from a visit to Ukraine.
On April 4, 2024, Aguto’s party left the maps on a train in Poland, sparking a brief panic. The documents were recovered the following day when the train returned to Kyiv.
“I used [sic] these maps quite frequently, regardless of where I’m at, to brief officials on the status of what’s going on in Ukraine, which is my job,” Aguto was quoted as telling the Department of War Office of the Inspector General in its 56-page report.
Investigators also found that the maps were improperly packaged in an unsecured cylindrical tube because “the maps were too big to wrap and the map tube was too small.”
Aguto also ran afoul of a July 2022 order issued by then-US Ambassador to Ukraine Bridget Brink that stated only diplomatic couriers could bring classified material into the country.
When interviewed, Brink confirmed to Pentagon investigators that Aguto had to “abide by our security rules, which includes a particular way of handling classified material.”
Another unidentified military official said that Aguto “should have had them courier[ed] in, either by one of our own couriers … through the appropriate process or have the embassy team do that.”
Aguto took responsibility for the misplaced maps, though he pointed out to investigators that his staff “generally don’t let me carry my bags, let alone a map case.”
The general was also reported for appearing intoxicated during a meeting with Brink and then-Secretary of State Antony Blinken on May 14, 2024.
The night before, during a dinner with a Ukrainian military official, Aguto downed some chacha, a type of Eastern European brandy that contains at least 40% alcohol by volume.
“As a general rule,” Aguto told investigators, “you start off the dinner with an alcoholic beverage, and then you drink through the night, or through the meal.”
Aguto acknowledged that he had been “some level of intoxicated,” and one witness estimated that he drank “approximately two bottles of chacha throughout the course of the night.”
After Aguto returned to his hotel room, he fell and hit his head at least twice. When he turned up for meetings the next morning, one witness said the general “looked very sluggish” and was “having a hard time walking straight.”
Aguto took another fall during a trip to the US Embassy that day, “striking his right elbow and his jaw on the concrete sidewalk.”
He was described as “cognitively diminished” during the meeting with Blinken and was later diagnosed with a concussion.
Aguto retired from the military after departing his Security Assistance Group command.
