President Donald Trump once promised to end the Russo-Ukrainian war within 24 hours of taking office. Instead, the war drags on. And now the president is sending mixed signals, suggesting he will abandon ceasefire negotiations even as he ratchets up rhetoric against Russia's Vladimir Putin.
Trump said Putin is acting "absolutely crazy" after Russia launched a new round of deadly drone and missile attacks against Ukraine over the weekend, said the BBC. The attacks are "needlessly killing a lot of people," Trump said on Truth Social. But the violence came amid increasing signs that Trump is ready to "walk away" from peace efforts, said The New York Times. After a phone call with Putin last week, Trump said on social media that any peace agreement "will be negotiated between the two parties" instead of through an American-led process. Trump has "grown weary and frustrated with both sides of the conflict," said Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt. The president's new position is that the war is "not my problem," said the Times.
Ukraine and its European allies have long feared that Trump would "throw up his hands" and declare that "neither side wants peace," Stephen Collinson said at CNN. That would allow Russia to "press on with its war of attrition and attacks on civilians." The weekend attacks raise a new possibility: Trump's criticism of Putin could mark a departure from his willingness to let Ukraine go forward without the U.S. at its side. Trump has "never been keen to criticize Putin" after all. But it is "risky to take Trump's weekend rhetoric at face value." For now there is no way to "be sure which way he'll jump."
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It was "always a possibility" that Trump would back out of the peace process, said Stefan Wolff at The Conversation. The possibility became more likely after initial ceasefire negotiations with Russia and Ukraine "predictably ended without a ceasefire agreement." Trump now appears to be more interested in a "broader reset of relations between the U.S. and Russia" than an end to the war. ("Russia wants to do large-scale trade with the United States" when the conflict ends, Trump said on Truth Social.) "Abandoning his mediation" between Moscow and Kyiv might aid that reset and allow closer trade relations between Trump and Putin's countries, but the result will be a "pyrrhic victory."
What next?
"Europe is on its own," said The Atlantic. That outcome was probably "inevitable," given Trump's skepticism of Europe and belief that American policy "should prioritize business and trade." But Trump's willingness to back out is "enabling Russia's advances." And it means Europe will increasingly be tasked with "supplying Ukraine with weapons and guaranteeing its future security."
Trump may have criticized Putin after the weekend attacks on Ukraine, but he "declined to answer questions about whether the attacks will lead to a change in policy," said the Times. After the weekend, though, Russia announced a prisoner exchange had been negotiated with Ukraine, said NBC News. Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov gave credit to the American president. Trump is a "man who wants results," Lavrov said.
