After his sixth conversation with Vladimir Putin since returning to the Oval Office—and only four months after resuming the powers of the presidency—Donald Trump acknowledged for the first time that he is not sure he can stop the Russian-Ukrainian war. He also voiced disappointment with the results of his talks with the Russian leader.
This was Trump’s first genuine disappointment—although Putin’s obvious unwillingness to accept any of his proposals had been plain earlier. The American president believed the key to ending the war lay in a frontline cease-fire, followed by a lengthy negotiating process sweetened with political and economic preferences. That logic seemed simple to Trump. But not to Putin—who sees the end of the war not in compromise, but in the destruction of Ukraine as a state.
From the very start of his talks with Trump, Putin used the negotiations not to achieve peace but to maintain contact with the American president while continuing hostilities. After their fourth phone call, Trump effectively agreed to talks during the war: he blocked sanctions already coordinated with European allies and persuaded Kyiv to join a sham dialogue, hoping Putin would value the gesture and agree to a cease-fire.
When even that failed, the American president went further. Before the sixth conversation, the United States suspended arms deliveries to Ukraine and had earlier partially lifted sanctions on a number of Russian financial institutions (formally as part of easing restrictions on Syria). These steps also produced no result. Putin again rejected all of Trump’s proposals—and even let his advisers mock the American president. Kremlin spokespeople afterwards said the chief achievement had been an agreement to exchange films—ones purportedly upholding the “shared values” of Russia and the new American administration.
Thus Trump finally realized that the process in which he had tried to persuade Putin had hit a dead end. This could have been said on day one, when Trump declared he would end the war in 24 hours. Yet it took four months to reach conclusions obvious even before his election: the U.S. president has no magic wand to make Putin stop the war. Joe Biden did not have it; Trump’s successor will not have it either. But every American president can help end the war—on terms vital to the civilized world.
In the United States, as in other Western countries, people often say Ukraine should be grateful for the aid. But the West is not helping for Ukraine’s sake; it is helping for its own. Ukrainians owe no thanks to Trump or to any other citizen of the United States or Europe—just as the residents of Kuwait, occupied by Iraq and liberated by a U.S.-led coalition, owed no thanks to George H. W. Bush.
The United States acted—and must act—to preserve the international order established after World War II, under which one state has no right to annex another’s territory. Everyone knows how Iraq under Saddam Hussein differs from Putin’s Russia: Russia is a nuclear power. But if the world accepts that a nuclear-armed state may do whatever it pleases with another nation’s land, the war in Ukraine will become a precedent—and the path to the spread of nuclear weapons across dozens of countries will open.
For a nuclear bomb would no longer be about defense; it would be a license for aggression.
The future of the world is being decided right now. If the United States proves it can deter nuclear blackmail and restore international law, it will save not only Ukrainian lives but, perhaps, millions of American lives in a potential future nuclear war.
So the issue is not gratitude. The point is that Ukrainians are now withstanding Russian aggression and fostering hope for a return to the force of law, not the law of force.
Thanks to this, citizens of other countries still have a chance to live in peace. And yes, none of those citizens can stop the war. But the President of the United States can do more than anyone else. He can at least:
– increase assistance to Ukraine,
– renew pressure with new sanctions,
– compel China and other allies of Moscow to stop buying Russian oil,
– deprive Putin of any illusion of returning to the international stage before the war ends.
And then, perhaps—if not to end the war—it will at least be possible to create the conditions for a cease-fire, giving all of us the opportunity to decide how to proceed. That will be the main outcome of Donald Trump’s six fruitless conversations with Vladimir Putin.
About Author:
