By Tom Fowdy
Yesterday, Donald Trump ordered that additional weapons be sent to Ukraine, following an attempt by some in the US Department of Defence to reduce shipments. Notably, the Pentagon Statement announcing the move stated that the weapons were "defensive" in purpose, without giving any specified details on what they might be.
The announcement and the vague wording were a sharp contrast in rhetoric to the consistent and politically orchestrated bravado of the preceding Biden administration, who routinely announced new weapon shipments once every two months alongside phrases such as "we will support Ukraine as long as it takes."
While we should consider the reality that there is clearly a mini civil war inside the Trump administration over Ukraine, leading to often contradictory and schizophrenic decision-making like this, I do not believe the mainstream media (especially European and British) narrative that Donald Trump has thrown Kyiv under the bus and has squarely conceded to Putin. As per all things critical of the US President, it is often subject to exaggeration and dramatization, placing far too much emphasis on what he says as opposed to what he does.
Although Donald Trump has shifted US foreign policy towards seeking peace in Ukraine with Russia, and therefore engaging with the Kremlin again, and thus is already heresy to the most ardent NeoConservatives, the President has not given Putin the keys to Kyiv. First, way back last year and at the beginning of this year, I predicted that Trump would not abandon Ukraine but would instead engage in his classic "America first" style, whereby he coerces them towards fulfilling certain interests and then supports them anyway.
This is essentially the context of the minerals deal. Trump performatively cut aid to Ukraine, demanded Kyiv hand over its essential minerals, and then subsequently restarted aid on securing it. It is not of course the moralistic crusade against Russia issued by the Biden administration, but nor is it capitulation to the Kremlin. Trump performatively airs hostility or uncertainty towards Kyiv as a bargaining tactic (such as storming out of the meeting with Zelensky), as he does with all things, while also appealing to his base who object to US aid to Ukraine.
But he does not throw them under the bus, because again rhetoric and action are not always correlated. Ask yourself, even though the Trump administration is not vocally announcing aid shipments like the Biden one was, does that mean they have stopped? We might ask ourselves if we assume the latter to be true, why haven't Ukraine collapsed entirely on the battlefield? We can observe from results on the ground that the White House has clearly stopped certain things, such as long-range missile strikes which Biden supplied and encouraged, other things have been business as usual, just more quietly and subtly, wrapped up in the innocuous PR language of "defensive" weapons.
In other words, the US has not abandoned Ukraine but has retreated to a less provocative, more realistic, continued support of it, one which does not push Russia's red lines and is wrapped up in MAGA language that serves America's protectionist and economic goals. The mineral deals alone should be enough clarification that Trump would have a vested interest in not losing the country in its entirety to Russian rule. Instead, the President's only goal is to simply end, or freeze the war as quickly as possible, so he can shift his agenda to Asia. While this of course offers Russia more room for compromise than its most ardent opponents are comfortable with (remember they want an all-out war with no compromise), it certainly isn't appeasement, which would realistically be defined as pulling the plug altogether, letting Russia steamroll Ukraine and thus creating "peace" on those terms, that's not what is happening.
Still, it is an arguable criticism that the President doesn't truly have a plan for ending the war at all. Russia and Ukraine, both for domestic political reasons, are happy to let the war continue to grind on precisely because the status-quo "frozen conflict" Trump desperately wants to end and declare victory from, is a political non-starter. Therefore, the jury is still out on to what extent the President is willing to play his hand to forcibly bring Moscow to the table, and if he is really willing to press Putin to give up his goal of pursuing the war until Ukraine is subjugated.
Biden's administration was all about pursuing war with no concept of victory, but Trump's all about pursuing peace with no concept of what that might also take. Thus the Ukraine stalemate continues, and the US will keep pouring weapons into it for the foreseeable future, even if the language is softer.
The views do not necessarily reflect those of DotDotNews.
Read more articles by Tom Fowdy:
Opinion | Did China really say Russia can't lose in Ukraine, how plausible is it
Opinion | Trump's new 'trade deal' with Vietnam is little more than one-sided subjugation
Opinion | Understanding China's Approach to the Middle East, and contrasting it with the US
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