Trump's Russia sanctions rejection leaves Europe with a few options, but to wait | Ukraine

GEn Keith Kellogg, Donald Trump's somewhat alienated special representative in Ukraine, it is said by some US diplomats that the president actually said that he would solve the Ukraine crisis in 24 hours, he simply had never stated 24 hours.

Dark humor may be everything that is up to the Europeans, since they not only absorb Trump's refusal to impose the promised “bone-covered sanctions” about the rejection of a 30-day ceasefire by Russia, but also the increasing signs that the government will wash the hands of Ukraine, and instead concentrate on a new economy partnership with Russia.

The mood among the European leaders, the Trump's description of his two-hour call with Vladimir Putin on Monday-a call, which did not bring a ceasefire-should range from desperately to apoplectic. The reports differ whether Trump said the European leader that Putin did not want peace or just that Putin thought that he would win. In both cases, no sanctions were imposed.

But just 24 hours earlier, Alexander Stubb, the Finnish President and sometimes Trump golf partner, spoke optimistically that Trump had lost patience with Putin's prediction, and the possibility that the US Senate would be the process of imposing sanctions of the President this week, which was punished by the close Ally Lindsey Grah, the state, the Russian oil. The seven hours that Stubb had spent in March for Trump's golf team seemed to maintain a tournament victory.

Trump accused great egos and said that the conditions for a deal could only be agreed by the warfare parties “because they know details of a negotiation that nobody else would know”. He said he was still thinking that “something could happen, and if it doesn't happen, I'll just step aside and you have to go on.” He continued: “Once again this was a European matter and it should have been a European matter.” The Vice President JD Vance simply said: “This is not our war.”

But days earlier, Kellogg had referred to a 20-point peace plan that had been shared with a ceasefire with the Europeans, which completely contradicted Trump's claim that only the warfare parties could have a look at the future of Ukraine.

The episode affects the holy grail of modern diplomacy: How can you best influence the thinking of the US President, be it above Ukraine, the Gaza, Iran or China.

A former US diplomat near Ukraine talks asked the Europeans to be patient with Trump. “He has a gut feeling, these instincts are okay, they are not always wrong, he zigzags, and in the case of Ukraine, he is most ruled by the tactic he needs to get an armistice,” said the former diplomat.

“He is quite aware of this area in this area. He knows that the only reason why there is no ceasefire is that Vladimir wants to wage Putin war. So he knows that his goal is to pull Putin tactically.

“Putin does not want to do this. He has no interest in a ceasefire. He has an interest in eliminating the national identity of the Ukrainian identity and taking it on purpose. He plays games. He moves the goal post almost every day and tries to follow him.

The former diplomat said Trump had four basic destinations in Ukraine. “Trump really wants to endure a ceasefire and the murder. He wants the mutuality so that he can tell the US taxpayer that they do not throw their money away on Ukraine.

“The United States and Ukraine have been geared towards the armistice rather than Trump, since Trump accepted his office. Trump has said several times that he would not throw Ukraine under the bus as an independent state.”

This verdict was confirmed by Marco Rubio, the US Foreign Minister, who said this week to hear the Senate: “Russia wants what they are currently not and that they are not entitled to, and Ukraine wants what they cannot regain militarily. And that was the core of the challenge.”

With regard to the possibility that Trump fulfilled his threat in March for the first time in order to meet Russia with punitive sanctions, Europeans have only a few ways to wait. You have invested strongly in Graham, a Republican senator of South Carolina and someone with whom Stubb speaks most of the days. Graham spoke to the President of the European Commission Ursula von der Leyen this week.

The former US diplomat said: “Congress cannot force Trump to do something, but you can be able to say that we can say goodbye to laws about sanctions to strengthen Trump's position. The Republicans on the hill do not portray this as an alternative to Trump, but how we support his strategy”. “

Therefore, the 80 senators who support Graham's legislation who buy Russian oil in countries that buy Russian oil also have to wait for Trump's green light. Of course, this light can never become green. Rubio told the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations: “If you start threatening sanctions, the Russians will stop talking.”

In addition, Russian reports on the two -hour call between Putin and Trump live in his warm personal nature and Trump's praise for Russian victims in the Second World War. In return, Putin offered to send a memorandum about a possible peace agreement. No deadlines were agreed.

As a result, the nightmare in Europe – Trump, who goes away from Ukraine – takes closer. But there are many ways to go away. Would he switch off the secret services, unilaterally raise sanctions against Russia and even block credit contracts that would enable Ukraine to buy weapons? In the slow transition to Europe, Trump takes the lead with the support of Ukraine. “It can be a managed process or a chaotic and broken process,” said Jack Watling from the defense Thintank Rusi.

The new US ambassador to NATO, Matthew Whitaker, said the Lennart Meri conference in Tallinn -an annual meeting of diplomats and security experts -that the USA would put plans for the withdrawal of troops from Europe after the NATO summit in June. Although Whitaker told his audience that the withdrawals would be carried out properly, not everyone was calmed down. Bruno Tertrais, an extraordinary expert at the Montaigne Institute, said: “The words” Trump “and” properly “in the same sentence do not score trust.”

A certain reduction in the 100,000 US troops in Europe is manageable for the continent, since the administration of the bidies after Ukraine invasion has increased around 20,000 soldiers, but the scale and method of withdrawal issues.

And it is difficult for the NATO summit to agree to a new sentence of ability goals if the scale of the US withdrawals will only be known in autumn. “NATO decisions about skills are made without knowing the future US power attitude in Europe,” said Torrey Taussig from Atlantic Council. “These decisions about the ability goals for combating our own defense of Europe and an armistice force in Ukraine are short -term decisions, but we do not know what America's contribution to Europe will look like.”

The feeling of frustration is deepened because the European NATO members have the feeling that they are a tax -demanding package for defense spending in good time for the NATO summit, which deals with all complaints from Trump about Freeloading. In the next five to seven years, the NATO countries will take a new goal in which 3.5% of GDP for hard defense and 1.5% for cyber security and defense-related infrastructure investments such as roads and bridges are spent improving troop mobility. (The aim is that the hard defense component increases by 0.2%annually.)

This could be enough to bring Europe over the hump of the NATO summit without Trump exploding, but it does not deal with the more fundamental problem of Trump's benign view of Russia. Stubb argues that Europe has to understand Trump's attitude of great power policy and find a way to expose it. “What we do not see in Europe is that the United States and its foreign policy doctrine are based on global competition and not on Ukraine and Russia. We have to get out of the attitude that the United States only concentrates on Ukraine.

Stubb added: “Trump's worldview is not far from what we saw in the 19th century concert-a great time of competition and sometimes cooperation. We have to convince the US administration that free trade and joint rules are better than transaction transactions.

If Trump's vision is largely one of the great areas of influence of the 19th century, Stubb argues, it is necessary to convince Trump that Russia is not a great power and is not worth a remote Ukraine and its allies. “We have to explain that Russia is not a big power economically. It is smaller than Italy, slightly larger than Spain [in terms of its economy]”He said.” Three years ago, the independent sovereignty and territorial integrity of Ukraine wanted to refuse. This year it has achieved less than one percentage point, and its interest rate is over 20% and its reserves are out. These are the type of news that they have to convey.

The Polish Foreign Minister Radosław Sikorski offers a variation: the great power of the future is Europe, not Russia. He argues that Putin “aroused a giant” on the continent. “He has no idea how expensive it will be. Since President Trump came to power, we have already doubled our defense spending,” he said.

Sikorski predicts that Europe will in the shade in the shade until the end of the decade, when NATO countries meet the new output targets. “We are a 19 dollar economy. Russia will be a trillion dollar economy. As Europe, we spend two and a half more than Russia for finding peace without the United States than to spend Russia for a war foot cast. All it needs is to spend the money better.

But that is therefore five years, and the immediate problem is whether Europe and Ukraine, with the United States on the side, have the means to re -evaluate Putin the victory price.

Watling, the defense analyst, argued that Ukraine was gaps on an extended front this summer. However, if she can survive, Russia will have exhausted its shares and rely on new production, which makes its war machine more susceptible to international supply chains. He said the problem of Ukraine was not workers, but training and ammunition.

In both cases, Iron has entered the soul of the European leader. They fear that Trump is not correct and relies on a different course and leaves Europe as a protector of Ukraine.

Kaja Kallas, Europe's head of foreign policy, said she had through the five stages of mourning about the transatlantic relationship and reached acceptance, but she cannot hide the loss.

“The topic of trust is like a vase,” she said. “You broke the vase, you can glue it together again, but it's not the same vase.”