It’s amazing what can happen without JD Vance in the room.
American and Ukrainian negotiators agreed after a summit in Saudi Arabia on Tuesday to bring things back to what appears to be square one, nearly the status quo ante-Trump-um.
The U.S. agreed to resume security assistance to and intelligence sharing with Ukraine, according to a joint statement. Kyiv expressed “gratitude,” first and foremost to President Trump, and recommitted itself to the minerals deal.
What’s gotten the most attention from the meeting is, in my view, what’s most telling, but not in the way most coverage has framed it: that Ukraine agreed to a 30-day ceasefire, provided that Russia complies with the same.
As the communique put it: “The United States will communicate to Russia that Russian reciprocity is the key to achieving peace.”
Okay. So, what just happened?
Part of it is that we’ve wasted a lot of time. Trump cut off security and intelligence assistance last week, not long enough to cause permanent damage, experts say, but long enough to drive a very bitter wedge into the relationship.
But mostly we’re left with an incredibly costly and pointlessly detrimental Trumpian performance. For weeks, the administration has been trying to coerce Ukraine into signing what is quite literally an extractive agreement; something that would have fit into the kinds of conspiracy theories that anti-Western propagandists would spread in Ukraine after the country’s 2014 revolution, about the supposed real aim of the revolution.
It also, if you squint, sort of positioned Trump into his favorite pose, that of dominance: Ukraine was squeezed, and now he’s relented.
But the big problem is that no progress has really been made towards ending the conflict. As the Ukrainians noted, they will only agree to a ceasefire if the Russians do so as well. They have reason to doubt that this will take place.
It goes to something that’s deeply frustrated me nearly since the war began: the big problem here is that Russia is attacking. For all of the complaints that Ukraine is throwing people into the meat grinder, that cynical politicians are dining out on mass death, about fear of NATO expansion or whatever motive you can find for Russia’s invasion, the problem remains the same: Russia is invading. And until someone can convince Russia either to stop attacking, or persuade the Ukrainians to fully capitulate, that will not change. Russian officials continue to say that their aim is to control all of Ukraine; they’re nowhere near to achieving that on the battlefield.
One valuable outcome of the showdown between Trump, Vance, and Volodymyr Zelensky was that it again demonstrated that the Ukrainians will not capitulate. It’s no accident that Vance attacked Zelensky in the Oval Office at the moment when Zelensky made a critical point: the Russian government doesn’t abide by its agreements. Ukraine’s persistence in the face of grim odds, and even in the face of abandonment by allies, undermines the whole MAGA approach of the past month, which has placed maximum pressure on Ukraine and none on Russia.
Last week, I talked some of this over with Steven Pifer, a former U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine. He called the past month “the most dismaying, embarrassing, appalling and disgusting thing. I’ve never seen an American foreign policy in 45 years, the way we have flipped on a partner country and now seem to be so eagerly seeking a relationship with an adversary.”
“Even if you’re doing that, you’re doing it the wrong way,” he added. “Putin, I think, right now looks at Trump and says, this guy is weak. I’m going to just sit back and wait for tomorrow’s concession.”
We’ll see what happens. Logically, now would be the time for actual pressure on Russia in order to secure a ceasefire. It seems more like we’re in for a lot more incoherence, and perhaps more betrayal.
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When the war started three years ago, I changed my FB profile picture and cover photo to support Ukraine.
It’s been there ever since. Three years has passed and the war continues.
In my view TPM has succinctly summed up the situation in the Ukraine and current American policy and what that policy should be and what to expect from Trump going forward
To begin with, in regard to the war itself this says it all:
This is the very reason for the war is Russia is trying to conquer Ukraine and make it Russia’s 51 state.
How does the war end?
So the war continues until Russia wins or gives up and goes back to Russia.
As for the Trump’s administration policy toward Russia’s invasion of Ukraine:
As for what American policy should be:
And finally what to expect from Trump:
There is one other option. Putin croaks. He is 72. A natural croaking or unnatural. It doesn’t matter. His successor will have much bigger issues than a war in Ukraine.
Well, at this point, Zelinskyy is vindicated. he said that Putin doesn’t keep his agreements or decisions. And as we speak, Kiev is being relentlessly bombed.
JD Vance, with his blathering, has made himself into the propaganda minister, i.e. the Joseph Goebbels for the Donald Trump administration. The office of the Vice President can no longer be described as “a bucket of warm spit.”