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Trump Will Walk Away From Ukraine
Foreign Affairs
Trump Will Walk Away From Ukraine
And that’s a good thing.
Credit: Joseph Sohm/Shutterstock
“This is not my war,” stated President Donald Trump emphatically to a dubious—nay, hostile—White House Press Corps when asked about the potential outcome of negotiations with Russia over ending the Ukraine War. Whether those in the corporate press fully grasped what the 47th president was saying is another matter.
Without stating it plainly, the president was essentially acknowledging that he had no real leverage over Russia to get them to end the war. So, rather than needlessly drag out this hopeless conflict (for the NATO side of the proxy war with Russia), where 5,000 young men die every week, Trump is readying to cut his, and America’s, losses.
Every patriotic American should welcome this outcome. Because it is very likely that the Ukraine War will go beyond merely a regional proxy war if the conflict continues longer with American support, a prospect compounded by the fact that the Ukrainians are getting increasingly desperate.
Thus, any negotiation will not be a serious affair. Rather, Trump needs the appearance of an attempted negotiation so that he can walk away and unilaterally declare peace. In so doing, the United States will finally be able to divorce itself from the losing Ukrainian situation.
There is, unfortunately, no cleaner way for Trump to leave this quagmire. His predecessor simply left Trump with no real leverage over either Ukraine or Russia.
The Europeans, America’s supposed allies in this shambolic proxy war, lack any significant military capacity on their own but are willing to fight Russia to the last Ukrainian. Once that last Ukrainian us killed off, the Europeans will giddily fight Russia in Ukraine to the last American GI. Trump understands this. He won’t play along forever with a delusional Europe and a recalcitrant Ukraine.
And so long as the leadership in Europe (and Britain) continue operating under the theory that they are somehow equals to either the United States or Russia, they will not engage in meaningful negotiations to end the war.
Of course, contrary to what the Europeans believe, Trump will not countenance indefinitely prolonging the conflict to appease his so-called allies (all of whom apparently believe “victory” against Russia is just around the corner if only NATO sends another round of lethal aid to Ukraine).
Meanwhile, the Ukrainian leadership under President Volodymyr Zelensky has even less desire—or incentive—to end the war. It should be clear to any observer of the conflict that Zelensky himself would likely either be killed or arrested (and then killed) if he stopped fighting the war before Ukraine achieves “victory.” Surrounded in many cases by literal neo-nazis (or their sympathizers), Zelensky is a glorified hostage of warmongering Ukrainian cadres. Let us not forget that, for all the ranting from Europe about how Ukraine is a “threatened democracy,” the national elections in Ukraine were suspended last summer and the Zelensky regime refuses to restart those elections—so Ukraine cannot even accurately describe itself as a “democracy.”
On the other hand, Russia, which we are told by the Western corporate press is “like, totally Nazi Germany,” has since the outbreak of the war at least entertained the pretenses of a presidential election, multiple regional elections, and next year’s upcoming federal legislative elections.
Just how does Kiev define “victory” in their war against Russia, anyway? According to the Ukrainian regime, victory over Russia is not merely the survival of Eurocentric Western Ukraine. Rather, they have made the goal the total reclamation of all territories lost to Russia since 2014—including Crimea, which Russian leaders have said they’d defend with nuclear weapons before returning to Kiev’s control—and the “derussification” of Eastern Ukraine and Crimea. That sounds an awful lot like ethnic cleansing. At the strategic level, the Ukrainian objectives are completely impractical, given just how outmatched the Ukrainians are by the Russian Armed Forces.
There’s the added issue of all the easy money that has been washing across Ukraine since the war and how many Ukrainian officials (and their families) have benefited greatly from that relationship with the West. Ending war invariably means ending the gravy train that’s been flowing into the bank accounts of powerful Ukrainians for more than a decade.
Expecting Zelensky or anyone in his inner circle to seriously seek peace under those circumstances is living in a fantasy believable only to elites in Brussels (and to the Democratic Party in the U.S.).
Trump, a man standing at the fulcrum point of history, knows he was passed a losing hand by the Biden administration when it comes to Ukraine. He understands that if he continues engaging in the conflict, either in seeking peace or fulfilling Ukraine’s repeated requests for more and ever increasing levels of lethal aid, America will never free itself from the conflict.
Eventually, the war will escalate and likely erupt into a wider war directly involving U.S. forces against Russian ones.
Trump will go through the motions. He’ll meet with Putin; he’ll placate the Europeans; he might even give some degree of further aid to Ukraine. But it will be just enough to maintain the appearance that Trump is holding fast and seeking a stronger hand in negotiations. Trump is a businessman, and he knows a losing position when he sees it. He understands when to cut his losses.
Besides, Trump has maintained for years that he wants healthier, stabler relations with Moscow. Continuing the war undermines that goal. Trump abandoning Ukraine after a short period of the appearance of negotiations to end the war with Russia will inevitably allow for the American president to start getting deals done with Russia.
On a bevy of issues, ranging from joint rare-earth mineral development deals to space exploration, a healthy and productive relationship between the U.S. and Russia is infinitely better for American national security than one of acrimony.
Not only will Trump walk away from Ukraine and let the geopolitical pieces fall as they may, he should let that happen. Trump campaigned as a non-interventionist president who favored commerce over war. It’s time we start living up to those promises rather than just talking about them. Because, as Trump rightly said of Ukraine, this is not his war. Nor should it be America’s.
The post Trump Will Walk Away From Ukraine appeared first on The American Conservative.
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