President Trump is putting pressure on Russian President Vladimir Putin on his first day in office, pressuring him to come to the negotiating table to end the war in Ukraine.
Just over 48 hours after returning to the White House, Trump said Putin was “destroying his country” with his nearly three-year war with Kiev and threatened to threaten Russia if an agreement was not reached quickly. It threatened to strengthen sanctions against its enablers.
He phrased his threat as flattering, saying he loved the Russian people and had “always had a very good relationship with President Putin.”
On this day, President Trump said on his social media site, Truth Social, “I do not want to cause harm to Russia.” “I will do Russia and President Putin a huge favor as their economy is failing. Now calm down and stop this foolish war! “The situation will only get worse.”
The post marks the opening blow to Trump’s efforts to show that his “peace through strength” policy could end Europe’s largest ground war in nearly a century.
The president enjoyed some early diplomatic successes in the Middle East. He dispatched his Middle East envoy, Steve Witkoff, in the final weeks of the Biden administration to pressure Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to accept a ceasefire and hostage release agreement with Hamas.
But the president said resolving Russia’s war in Ukraine was a more difficult challenge than in the Middle East.
President Biden’s team did a lot of hard work during a year of negotiations on the text of a final ceasefire between Israel and Hamas. As Trump intervened, he deployed the political capital he had built during his first term with Israel and its regional partners.
But Russia’s war in Ukraine is a different beast.
Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022 was a shocking violation of the post-World War II order, with Moscow seeking to alter the sovereign nation’s borders by force.
Ukraine succeeded in preserving the country by repelling Russian forces surrounding Kiev in the first few days, but failed to drive Russia out of about 20% of Ukrainian territory in eastern Ukraine. This includes the administrative districts of Luhansk, Donetsk, and Crimea, in addition to the territory that Russia invaded and annexed in 2014.
Three years after the war began, the Ukrainian army is struggling to replenish its forces, and its population faces almost daily attacks on civilian areas and energy infrastructure. This is an attempt to freeze the country during the winter. And the Russian military is known to be carrying out targeted drone attacks targeting civilians in frontline cities.
Ukrainian public opinion is increasingly open to negotiations to end the war as quickly as possible. And Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said he was optimistic Trump’s decisiveness could change the dynamics of the war.
“He can play a decisive role in this war. He can stop President Putin, and to be fair, he can help us stop President Putin. He can do this,” Zelensky said.
In a speech from the Oval Office on Monday, Trump said he believed Zelenskyy wanted to negotiate.
“I don’t know if President Putin will, but he might not. He has to negotiate,” Trump said.
But Russia and Ukraine are not the only players. The United Nations is firmly entrenched on both sides of the battle, and numerous countries straddle the line.
Sam Greene, director of democratic resilience at the Center for European Policy Analysis, a Washington, D.C.-based think tank, said Trump needs unity with Europe to influence Russia.
If he follows through on his promise to impose high tariffs on the continent, that could be difficult.
“The reality is that Trump, and the United States as a whole, does not have tremendous influence on both sides of this conflict,” Greene said.
“It’s not beyond the realm of possibility that Trump, Waltz, Rubio and whoever else is going to be important in foreign policy sit down and begin to identify and prioritize all of the overlapping and interlocking interests,” he added. Mention National Security Advisor Mike Waltz and Secretary of State Marco Rubio.
“We’re not there yet. “I think it would be foolish for the Russians to feel like they are under a lot of pressure from Washington until we get there.”
Zelenskyy chastised Europe for failing to leverage its power in a speech to the World Economic Forum on Tuesday.
“Will President Trump listen to Europe or negotiate with Russia and China without Europe?” he asked with a blunt warning. “Europe must learn how to take full care of itself so that the world cannot ignore it.”
President Putin is scarred by war, but not defeated. Russian leaders have leveraged domestic military production to boost the economy and have relied on a network of countries to evade international sanctions, from superpowers like China and India to international outcasts like Iran and North Korea.
Chinese President Xi Jinping is President Putin’s most important ally in this war. The two declared an ‘unlimited partnership’ in February 2022, just before Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine, and declared a ‘new era’ for the two partnerships in May. Both Putin and Xi see the United States and democracy as a threat to the survival of their authoritarian regimes.
Putin and Xi discussed deepening relations between the two countries in a phone call on Monday, and Putin said he was ready for dialogue with the United States on the Ukraine issue.
Green said it was likely that Putin would offer a deal to the Russian public, but that it would still be difficult for them to agree to a halt to the war.
“Even if Putin doesn’t control all of Ukraine or all of the territory claimed by the Russian government, he can find a way to raise the mission accomplished flag. But what Russia needs to do is stay out of conflict and confrontation with the West,” Green said.
