Putin has left the US President looking weak – a patsy in thrall to the fascistic dictator
One year ago, I was in Pennsylvania listening to Ukrainian Americans explain how some members of their community were backing Donald Trump in the election on the basis that he was most likely to help Ukraine turn the tide in its war with Russia.
Their argument was simple: Trump, they said, was so vain and unpredictable that he would grow frustrated eventually with the intransigence of Vladimir Putin – and then, taking it as a personal affront, drastically ratchet up the supply of weapons to Kyiv.
It was a theory I heard repeatedly on the right: that Trump could be the man to bring this cruel conflict to an end by bludgeoning through diplomatic roadblocks. This twisted logic was echoed here by former Tory prime minister Boris Johnson.
Instead we watched with horror as Trump – restored to the presidency – humiliated President Volodymyr Zelensky in the White House, spewed out Kremlin propaganda, severed support for Kyiv, and rolled out the red carpet for Putin during that badly judged Alaska summit.
Russia’s leader reportedly concluded from the Anchorage meeting that however hard his armed forces struck Ukraine, Trump was unlikely to do very much to assist Kyiv’s military or stiffen their air defences.
So the Kremlin carefully strokes Trump’s ego – even sympathising over his failure to win the Nobel Peace Prize last week – to the American President’s clear delight. Then it carries on with its murderous barrage of atrocities and war crimes in Ukraine.
Trump, the elected leader of a democratic superpower who claims to be making his country great again, is left looking weak – a patsy in thrall to the fascistic dictator who is waging war on our liberal values with the aid of his autocratic allies.
Yesterday, after a phone call with Putin, Trump announced that the two would meet again, this time in Budapest, Hungary. So will anything shift in Trump’s approach at his second meeting with the Russian despot?
He has talked tough at times. He has issued at least seven deadlines for sanctions that never materialised, insulted Russia as a “paper tiger”, and recently rattled the Kremlin by suggesting Ukraine might be able to win back all its stolen terrain.
Yet the Kremlin admits peace talks are on “serious pause” while its drones and missiles rain down with even more intensity on Ukrainian cities and infrastructure in its effort to wear down resistance and morale.
Last weekend Zelensky said more than 3,100 drones, 1,360 glide bombs and 92 missiles were fired at his nation the previous week. Their air defences intercept 74 per cent – which is impressive, but still means many get through to increase the misery for Ukrainians.
Bear in mind that Trump’s regime initially undermined Ukraine’s defence by freezing the shipment of crucial air defence missiles and other key weapons. It was only last month that it approved the first sale of Patriot ammunition, funded by Nato allies.
The big question is whether anything will change now following Trump’s Gaza deal, when he did ram through the ceasefire and hostage handover. Basking in adulation for this fragile success, he says that securing peace in Ukraine is his next priority.
We must hope Trump finally sees there is only one way to force the grotesque Russian dictator to the negotiating table: by strengthening Ukraine sufficiently so the Kremlin is forced to confront the reality of Russian weakness.
On Friday he meets Zelensky again at the White House, following two phone calls between the pair over the past week. There have been frothy media reports about their warming relationship with claims the US is helping Kyiv to strike oil refineries – although far too many people have been fooled in the past by Trump’s hollow rhetoric.
Yet this meeting comes as polls indicate a sharp rise in support among Republicans for arming Ukraine and imposing sanctions if Putin refuses to negotiate an end to the bloodshed – plus alarm over Trump’s stance towards Russia and the war.
He is floating the idea of letting European allies buy long-range Tomahawk cruise missiles for Ukraine, which would enable Kyiv to extend its strikes on Russia’s infrastructure. Zelensky has indicated a deal might be on the cards.
These missiles – fast, low-flying and hard to detect with radar – would help Ukraine hit Moscow’s energy sector and military factories, along with the new locally made cruise missiles that have started striking Russia in recent days. Additionally, it would increase the pressure on Germany to supply its bunker-busting Taurus missiles.
The aim is to inflame heat on Moscow’s economy while hampering military logistics and stirring up public concerns. “The most effective sanctions, the ones that work the fastest, are the fires at Russia’s oil refineries,” said Zelensky last month.
Many regions of Russia are suffering fuel shortages with prices rising significantly and filling stations restricting sales. One newspaper reported recently that half the petrol stations in Crimea had run out of supplies.
Meanwhile, for all the talk about Moscow’s grinding military gains and justified alarm over Kyiv’s manpower shortages, Putin’s forces are still battling for Pokrovsk – a town just 50 miles from the city of Donetsk that has been under attack for more than a year – and making bogus claims about recapturing most of Kupiansk in Kharkiv region, which it grabbed and then lost in 2022.
Like Ukraine, it is also seeing rising levels of desertion, with leaked Russian defence ministry documents revealing at least 50,000 soldiers have fled their army.
There are signs that Russia, despite its much bigger population, is struggling to find recruits for the bloodstained frontline meatgrinder, with one regional governor quadrupling payments for new recruits on top of military salaries twice the national average.
Yet for all the setbacks, the economic struggles and huge scale of Russian losses, Putin still seems determined to continue his stupid fight to defeat Ukraine in retaliation for its citizens daring to dream about freedom and democracy.
Pete Hegseth, the US Secretary of Defence, just told his Nato counterparts that if Putin continues to shun peace talks the administration stands ready to support Kyiv “in ways that only the United States can do”.
More bold talk. But has Trump really lost patience with Putin, as we must hope and as I heard predicted a year ago? Or is this just more hollow bluster from a US President who will then go down in history for betrayal of a brave nation and the global cause of freedom in face of its assault by dictatorship?
