In a remarkably calm and candid interview with the BBC’s Gary O’Donoghue a few weeks ago, Donald Trump was asked if he was “done” with Vladimir Putin. The president replied directly: “I’m not done with him, but I’m disappointed in him.”
A week later, as if to prove the point, President Trump announced a 50-day deadline for Putin to end the war. Last week, with zero response from the Kremlin and continued attacks on Ukrainian civilians, that deadline was brought forward to the end of this week, and Mr Trump sent his personal envoy, Steve Witkoff, to Moscow.
There is no immediate sign that Mr Witkoff has achieved any kind of breakthrough with the Russian leader. Mr Trump’s patience with the Russians, previously seeming irrationally inexhaustible, must be wearing extremely thin. It may be that, much against his intentions both in the campaign last year and in his diplomacy during his first term, President Trump may well be soon “done” with Putin. That opens up a whole new dimension of uncertainty.
Having, in effect, made the US “switch sides” in the war on Ukraine to the consternation of Nato allies, could it be that Mr Trump will come full circle and back President Zelensky, a man he roundly abused in that shameful incident in the Oval Office in February? With the capricious Mr Trump, it is hard to tell.
It is unlikely that he’ll change his view that the war is futile, that Ukraine cannot win, and that he does not want American money or, still less, personnel, committed to yet another “forever war”. But that does not mean he is going to adopt a stance of neutrality.
He has been willing to ship substantial quantities of armaments to Ukraine, albeit with European allies paying for them – and the minerals deal does give America some material stake in the survival of Ukraine.
Moreover, Mr Trump – increasingly resentful about the Kremlin rebuffing his overtures and Putin stringing him along – has threatened further sanctions on Russia, where once he was eager to drop them and build closer trade links with Russia (in a stark contrast with policy towards America’s closest allies and the rest of the world). He is presently engaged in a trade war and war of words with the Indian government about its open willingness to buy Russian oil and, thus, fund Russia’s war machine.
This new pressure on third parties, including China, goes much further than President Biden’s policy, and does indeed put America closer onside with what Kyiv wishes it to do. Tariffs are an offensive and self-defeating weapon in economic terms, but in the diplomatic context they can prove highly effective. Neither India nor China should want to lose access to the US market merely to prop up Putin’s stumbling economy. Some analysts think that, with increasing isolation, Russia could be bust within months.
Should Mr Trump have a strategic purpose, it should be to stay out of the Ukraine conflict militarily but still to seek to bring the fighting to an end. That is easiest done by making the Russian war machine bankrupt. In such circumstances, Putin will be much more willing to agree to a ceasefire and restart talks. Without such pressure, the rational thing for the Russians to do is to press on with their “meat-grinder”, making slow but gradual territorial gains, leveraging their advantage in manpower and the assistance of powers such as China, Iran and North Korea.
It may not be a coincidence that Saudi Arabia led Opec in boosting fossil fuel production, lowering global prices and reducing the value of Russian exports – illicit or otherwise.
President Trump may also soon subscribe to the European cap on the price of Russian oil purchases and take a more aggressive stance towards Russia’s “shadow fleet” of unregistered tankers that are used to ferry oil into international markets and avoid sanctions. They are hard to trace, but not invisible, and can be impounded.
At any rate, his Ukraine policy has proved a failure for Mr Trump. CNN has counted 53 occasions, dating back to 2023, when Mr Trump claimed that he would end the war in Ukraine within 24 hours, or the like, and he has obviously not even begun to do so.
More recently, he claimed that he meant it “figuratively”, as a deliberate, purposeful exaggeration. Some doubt that – but there is little prospect for any kind of peace unless Mr Trump decisively steps up the pressure on Putin.
“Peace through strength” is another of Mr Trump’s favourite sayings, but it has not always been lived up to. This time he needs to mean it.
