Stephen J. Cimbala & Lawrence J. Korb
Donald Trump campaigned for his second term in the White House on the assumption that he could settle the war in Ukraine within a very short time after having reassumed the Presidency in January 2025.
Trump’s optimism was based on his self-confidence as a deal maker and his expectation that personal rapport with Vladimir Putin could cut through the obstacles to any agreement between Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and Russian President Vladimir Putin. Toward this end, Team Trump unleashed a blitz of diplomatic exigency and public relations intended to force Ukraine and Russia to the negotiating table.
In addition, Trump and Secretary of State Marco Rubio emphasized that they expected prompt compliance with their wishes by Zelensky and Putin for direct negotiations and immediate progress toward a final agreement. In an embarrassing televised confrontation between Trump,
Rubio and Vice President J.D. Vance with Zelensky in the Oval Office, Trump and Vance scolded Zelensky for his alleged insincerity with respect to their mandate for peacemaking.
The expectation that a peaceful resolution to the war in Ukraine could be arranged expeditiously by forcing a diplomatic solution on Kyiv and Moscow has now been put to the test and come up short. Regardless of good intentions in Washington, neither Ukraine nor Russia is willing to call it quits on the battlefront. For Ukraine,
Russia’s continued occupation of about 20 per cent of their national territory is unacceptable, and the devastation inflicted on Ukrainian civilians and infrastructure will live long in their collective memories. For Russia,
and especially for Putin, this war is also existential, not just expedient. Putin lives in a cocoon of denial that Ukraine is a sovereign country and a unique culture. Instead, full of balderdash concocted by his favorite philosopher Aleksandr Dugin, Putin sees the incorporation of Ukraine into Mother Russia as history’s inevitable destiny.
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