The judgment of a man who fails to distinguish between aggressor and victim when describing the Russia-Ukraine war is not worthy of respect. Unfortunately, when that man is the US president, his opinion cannot be ignored.
Earlier this year, Donald Trump asserted that Vladimir Putin had “all the cards” and urged Volodymyr Zelenskyy to make peace in terms that resembled surrender. This week, Mr Trump declared that Kyiv might achieve total victory, liberating all territory currently under Russian occupation.
This assessment follows a process described by the president as “getting to know and fully understand the Ukraine/Russia military and economic situation”. Mr Trump offered to continue supplying American weapons for Nato “to do what they want with them”. Asked about Russian incursions into airspace over alliance members, the president suggested the offending jets could be shot down. This was later qualified as a prescription to be followed only “if they’re attacking”.
Given Mr Trump’s capacity for hyperbole, self‑contradiction and spouting nonsense, it is hard to evaluate the significance of his sudden enthusiasm for Ukrainian liberation and gung-ho attitude to Moscow’s military provocations.
It is not wholly new. His attitude to Mr Zelenskyy has evolved quite gradually, and with assiduous encouragement from European leaders, from contempt to courtesy and now something like respect. With Mr Putin he has veered from credulous admiration to wary patience to tetchy frustration and back again. He has set deadlines for the Kremlin to stop the killing or face more robust sanctions, and failed to follow through. Asked this week whether he still trusted the Russian president, Mr Trump said he would know in a month’s time.
Judging by recent precedent, that leaves ample scope for yet another shift in position; another round of craven indulgence for Kremlin narratives about the war.
Such inveterate unreliability makes it hard to divine motive in the White House. Sincere interest in protecting democracy against authoritarian attack and strategic investment in the security of the US’s historical allies are, sadly, not plausible explanations. They wouldn’t be consistent with Mr Trump’s ongoing assault on the US’s own constitutional order, or with his well-attested tendency to see everything through the lens of ego and self-aggrandisement.
In that context, the likelier reason is ongoing determination to earn plaudits as a great peacemaker, coupled with belated realisation that Mr Putin will not end a war that he still believes he can win. Having tried to bully Ukraine into capitulation, Mr Trump may now be attempting something more like deterrence – ramping up the cost of the war for the Kremlin to see if that moves the dial towards a ceasefire.
If so, it is certainly a better plan than appeasement, which only encouraged further aggression. Mr Trump’s assessment of the balance of strength on the battlefield is more optimistic on Ukraine’s behalf than most independent analysis, but it would also become self-fulfilling if followed up with sufficient military aid. The same applies to his gloomy prognosis for Russia’s economy if tougher sanctions are expedited.
If Mr Trump is indeed converted to the cause of maximising pressure on the Kremlin as a means to end the war, it is a transformation that Kyiv’s more stalwart allies should welcome but cannot rely upon. It presents a strategic opportunity to be seized and maximised on the understanding that it may not last.
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