Ukraine: Support to shakedown
February 24, 2025
On February 22, President Donald Trump made a counteroffer to one he received in November from Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky that offered Americans access to its resources, worth billions, in return for their continuing support of its war against Russia. Trump liked the offer but disliked Zelensky and proposed a rapacious replacement to protect Americans from corruption. It proposed that the two countries would form the Reconstruction Investment Fund to rebuild the country, which would be 100% owned by the United States and entitled to 50% of the net income from all of Ukraine’s mining deposits, hydrocarbons, forestry, infrastructure, and ports until a total of $500 billion was reached. The deal would help rebuild the country and protect American investors but would also indenture Ukrainians for decades. Trump also labeled Zelensky a “dictator” and rejected Ukraine’s entry into NATO, so on February 23, Zelensky announced he could not sign Trump’s counter-offer. He stated, “If peace for Ukraine requires me to step down, I’m ready. Another scenario is that I could trade my position for NATO membership if that’s what it takes.”
Trump has not responded, but his grudges are rooted in deep-seated emotional disorder, and his continuing hatred toward Zelensky dates back to a phone call in 2020 when Trump threatened to stop American military aid to Ukraine unless Zelensky concocted charges against Joe Biden’s son, who worked there. Zelensky refused, but the request was overheard, leading to Trump's impeachment. The continuation of Trump’s resentment again dominates world affairs and may result in Zelensky’s departure at a critical time during a hot war. Worse, Trump's rancor may influence talks between the US and Russia on how to end the war. The final negotiations will come down to a summit between Trump and Vladimir Putin, and Trump is biased and refers to Putin as a “friend” even though the Russian is an absolute dictator and perpetrator behind wars around the world.
Trump’s vindictiveness is a risk to the world order because failure to negotiate a fair peace deal means that Russia will continue its violence in Europe and around the world. Trump’s animus also extends to Europe, which he has side-lined from peace talks, even though Trump intends to hand it responsibility for Ukraine’s military protection. He also poses other global positions that are not fact-based. For instance, he denies that Ukraine is a victim but maintains it is a perpetrator and that it cannot win the war even though Russia is losing it. The contrary evidence to his statements? On February 22, three years after Putin invaded Ukraine, Russia’s central bank sold 100 tons of Russian gold – worth a staggering US$6 trillion – according to Radoslaw Sikorsky, Poland’s foreign minister. This liquidation only occurred because Russia was on the ropes economically.
Trump, instead of bad-mouthing Ukraine’s leadership, should acknowledge their incredible success in garnering financial and military support and degrading the world’s second-biggest military. Moreover, Kyiv has, in just three years, reinvented war due to its technological capability and built an army of 900,000 soldiers from scratch, which is bigger than the armed forces of Britain, France, and Poland combined. But Trump ignores these facts, clings to grudges, and also harbors two dangerous beliefs: Firstly, he believes Putin wants peace even though there’s not a shred of evidence; and secondly, Trump believes he’s the most brilliant negotiator in the world when the facts show otherwise.
For instance, Trump agreed to talks with Russia without first insisting on serious good-faith concessions in advance — not simply the release of an American who was caught with marijuana in Moscow and then jailed. In addition, instead of assembling a tough team, Trump’s surrogates are amateurs who have allowed Russia to take the initiative at talks. Putin gives up nothing and demands that the G7 and the United Nations General Assembly scrap their condemnations of his 2022 invasion. He wants to keep all the land he’s stolen, and he wants to prevent Ukraine from ever joining NATO, fielding an army, or even having peacekeepers from other countries to protect itself.
Worse, Trump fields a “B team” to negotiate, not an “A team”, resulting in rookie errors. “The Russian delegation brought a collective 76 years of high-level government service to the table in Riyadh compared to that of the US representatives whose experience was measured in weeks,” reported the Kyiv Post. For example, US delegation leader Secretary of State Marco Rubio proposed a moratorium on civilian energy grid strikes by Russia during the talks. The next day, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov brushed off the request and said Russian targets never aimed at Ukrainian civilians or its infrastructure. Within hours, Russia launched hundreds of drones at Ukraine’s energy grid, leaving hundreds of thousands of civilians out of power.
The Americans are outplayed, and every concession they request from Moscow is ignored and followed by more demanding positions by the Russians. Moscow refuses to acknowledge any wrongdoing and demands that Ukraine “cede” all the portions of four regions that are not yet fully occupied by Russia following its 2014 and 2022 invasions. Instead, Trump’s negotiators fail to realize they have enormous leverage or to use it. They should make it clear that, militarily, the West is at least 10 times wealthier than Russia and can afford to increase funding for Ukraine or become directly involved. They should demand $1 trillion in reparations from Russia for Putin’s genocidal invasion, which has destroyed Ukraine’s people, churches, schools, cities, and farmlands. They should amplify the demand to return tens of thousands of Ukrainian children abducted and sent to Russia to be raised in Russian families or orphanages.
Trump’s shocking diplomatic cave-in upsets Americans, including John Bolton, Trump’s national security advisor during his first term and former US ambassador to the UN. “He [Trump] thinks he and Putin are friends, and he doesn’t like Zelenskyy. Trump is repeating things that the Russians would like the rest of the world to believe that isn’t true. Every time you turn around, Trump is giving Putin a bigger advantage.”
Trump’s favoritism toward Putin is inexplicable and also drew an emotional rebuke from key Republican Senator Thom Tillis. “Whoever believes that there is any space for Vladimir Putin and the future of a stable globe, better go to Ukraine; they better go to Europe.” Tillis went on about Putin: “They better invest the time to understand that this man is a cancer and the greatest threat to democracy in my lifetime. And it will be a cancer that spreads into the South China Sea, into Taiwan, and metastasizes across the globe.”
Fortunately, some American media, including Republican outlets, are also criticizing Trump’s tactics. The rapacious counter-offer made by Trump to Ukraine was strongly condemned by the Republican New York Post. “To squeeze the war-crippled country for all we can, simply because we can, would be despicable. On this one, Trump is asking for too much.” On Fox News, American investor and Russian critic Bill Browder called the deal offered to Ukraine “like getting war reparations from Ukraine, who’s the victim. Russia should be handing over its natural resources for all the money that we've spent, not Ukraine. Ukraine needs to rebuild, and they need to defend themselves. To punish Ukraine seems like a highly unsympathetic position."
Finally, the leaders of Europe’s two nuclear powers, Britain and France, are engaged and will meet with Trump this week to pitch a “reassurance force” of European peacekeepers to guard Ukraine once a truce is signed. However, they will need American logistical and air support, which may become a negotiating point. Meanwhile, the indefatigable Zelensky plans a conference with the coalition of 30 nations that support Ukraine’s struggle and has offered to quit if that helps his country survive.
Notably, Ukrainians and their armed forces maintain morale in the trenches and cities throughout this turmoil — because they simply must. This is not only an unjust war they must wage but a lesson to the rest of us to fight against an unjust peace proposed by an emotionally afflicted Donald Trump.
It really seems that Trump considers the world as a pool of unrelated real estate targets. One sees it in his Art of the Deal, where lying and cheating are main tools, and that there has to be a winner and a looser. There is no understanding there of how the real world is so interconnected, and one reason why Trump’s strategy is so misguided. The best thing that one can say about the whole thing is that Trump is accelerating the unification of the world’s democracies more than any other event since WWII (against the USA).
Trump's favoritism toward Putin can be expained through his envy of Putin's power. He sees each of them (and Xi) as gang leaders, and Putin as the most powerful of them. He nelieves that if he can be accepted by Putin as one of oligarchs, he will be in position to challenge him for the top spot. In his blind ambition, Trump believes he can outsmart Putin. He is willing to bet the entire country on his desire to be the king of the rats.