In a sudden shift, Trump says Ukraine can win the war

President Donald Trump’s pivot could give him room to distance himself from a conflict that he once promised to solve in days or weeks

By David E Sanger

President Donald Trump reversed himself on one of the key foreign policy issues of his presidency Tuesday, abandoning his insistence that Ukraine give up land to strike a peace deal with Russia and instead declaring that Ukraine, with the support of Europe, was “in a position to fight and WIN all of Ukraine back in its original form.”

His turnabout on social media shortly after a meeting in New York with President Volodymyr Zelenskyy of Ukraine was a head-spinning pivot. After his three-hour meeting with Russia’s president, Vladimir Putin, in Alaska more than five weeks ago, he insisted that Zelenskyy would have to face reality and make a deal, giving up territory to its larger and stronger neighbour.

Trump provided no rationale for his stunning turnaround, though several European officials suspected that by distancing himself from the war, the president was washing his hands of a conflict that he once promised to solve in days or weeks. In his eight months in office, Trump has ricocheted from one position to another on Ukraine.

In February, he slammed Zelenskyy for insisting on America’s aid, yelling at him in the Oval Office, “You don’t have the cards.” In the spring, he cultivated Putin, exempting him from tariffs. This summer, he rolled out a red carpet for him in Alaska.

Now he sounded as if he was siding anew with Ukraine while also taking something of a back seat, ending with the words, “I wish both Countries well.”

Hours after he declared Ukraine could “win” over the Russians, perhaps even taking land beyond its own boundaries, he was contradicted by his own secretary of state and acting national security adviser, Marco Rubio. Rubio said the war in Ukraine “cannot end militarily” and predicted “it will end at the negotiating table,” reflecting Trump’s previous position.

In Alaska, Trump had taken a similar position, even promising to meet with the two adversaries together to hammer out an agreement. He had rejected the idea of pressing Putin for a ceasefire, declaring that a full peace accord would be more permanent.

With Rubio, Trump was even in discussions with European allies about creating some kind of post-peace accord security force for Ukraine, one that he said could include US air support, to protect a “no-fly zone” over Ukraine.

But on Tuesday, after his nearly hourlong speech to the United Nations in which he only briefly touched on the Ukraine conflict that has consumed American national security officials since the Russian invasion in February 2022, Trump dispensed with that strategy.

Clearly frustrated with Putin, who embarrassed him by never executing on the peace negotiations that Trump insisted they had agreed upon, Trump wrote a long post on Russia’s economic and strategic difficulties. “Russia has been fighting aimlessly for three and a half years a War that should have taken a Real Military Power less than a week to win,” he said, using his distinctive capitalisation. “This is not distinguishing Russia.”

He added that Putin’s forces were a “paper tiger” — the reverse of how he had described the nuclear armed nation before. He also wrote about gasoline lines and the vast amounts of money being spent by Russia on the war. “Putin and Russia are in BIG economic trouble,” he said.

But all of that was true before the meeting in Alaska. And Trump never explained why he now believed that Ukraine, which has continuously lost modest amounts of territory to Russian troops over the past year, would suddenly be able to seize it back.

As one senior NATO military officer in New York for the United Nations meetings noted, Ukraine was not able to gain ground when US aid to the country was at a peak, and the Russians had not massed a larger force.

Nor did Trump offer to restore the tens of billions of dollars in US military aid, saying simply, “We will continue to supply weapons to NATO for NATO to do what they want with them.”

While Trump’s statement made it sound like the United States and NATO operate with their own rationale, the reality is more complicated. NATO military forces are commanded by an American general who also has the title Supreme Allied Commander Europe, a post currently held by Gen. Alexus G Grynkewich.

But the decisions about how much to spend on arming Ukraine will be influenced heavily by the largest European powers in the NATO alliance — led by Britain, France and Germany — and the secretary-general of NATO, Mark Rutte.

Zelenskyy, speaking at the United Nations, decided his best strategy was to welcome the news and praise Trump, with whom he had the famous on-camera blowup in February. At that time, Trump and Vice President J D Vance had yelled at him for not being sufficiently grateful to the United States. Now, Zelenskyy said of Trump, “I think that he is more close now to the situation.”

Speaking in English to reporters, Zelenskyy called Trump a “game-changer.”

It may be months before it is clear whether Trump’s declaration amounts to a game-changer, and for which side in the brutal conflict. And there are scenarios in which the United States could still be drawn into the conflict.

For example, Trump on Tuesday said that NATO countries had the right to shoot down Russian military aircraft that enter their airspace. In Estonia last week, Russian fighter jets spent 12 minutes over the tiny country. Days before, Russian drones flew deep into Poland, an event Trump quickly suggested may have been a “mistake,” only to be contradicted by President Emmanuel Macron of France.

But when Trump was pressed by reporters on whether he would back up his allies if they found themselves in an air war over NATO territory, he said it “depends on the circumstances.”

One of the many unknowns now is how Putin will react to Trump’s shift. He had clearly calculated, after the Alaska meeting, that the president had no stomach for a continued conflict, and no interest in donating billions more to the Ukrainian cause or letting American soldiers join a NATO peacekeeping force.

So he may take solace in Trump’s pullback, even if the American president is ultimately expressing some support for Ukraine. Or Putin may decide to amplify his attacks and his threats, figuring that time and mass will favour Russia.

(Disclaimer: The views expressed above are the author's own. They do not necessarily reflect the views of DH.)