Hail to the thief

Trump’s approach to this war is far away from the principles of international law and justice. He simply does not care about them, thinking instead of only money. He said of Ukraine: “They may be Russian someday, or they may not be Russian someday. But we’re going to have all this money in there and I say, ‘I want it back.’”

To push Zelensky to sign the rare earth deal, Trump’s special envoy Keith Kellogg reportedly blackmailed him with the imminent shutoff of Elon Musk’s Starlink satellite internet access for Ukraine’s army, which is crucial for the troops’ coordination, intelligence, drone operations and artillery.

All that looks like exchanging Ukraine’s minerals for security guarantees – but for Russia, not Ukraine. Add to that US defence secretary Pete Hegseth’s statement ruling out Ukraine’s NATO accession and its hopes of returning to its 2014 borders, and you basically have the list of Putin’s demands about ending the war on his terms.

Friends with benefits

The Trump-led US seems to be no longer Ukraine’s strategic partner but Russia’s. For the first time since the war started, the US has rejected:

• Calling Russia an aggressor in the G7 statement
• Zelensky’s participation in the G7 leaders’ virtual summit
• Putting its name to a draft UN resolution supporting the territorial integrity of Ukraine, condemning Russian aggression and demanding an immediate withdrawal of Russia’s troops from Ukraine.

Instead, the US has offered its own, three-paragraph-long resolution draft, which does not call Russia the aggressor. Having accepted Russia’s amendment about “root causes” of the war, the draft’s final line now says only that the world: “implores a swift end to the conflict, including by addressing its root causes, and further urges a lasting peace between Ukraine and Russia.”

Putin has been saying for years that the “root causes” of the war are “Kyiv’s illegal regime” and “Nazis in Ukraine”, while the aims of Russia’s “special military operation” are “full denazification and demilitarisation of Ukraine”.

Trump has not repeated this – yet. But in just over a week, he has adopted and spread all main talking points of Kremlin propaganda, reflecting Putin’s worldview by:

• Calling Zelenskiy “a dictator without elections” and claiming his poll ratings are only 4% (52% in reality)
• Echoing Putin on “Kyiv’s illegal regime” and calling for elections to be held in Ukraine during wartime, when the country has 20% of its territories occupied, 5 million refugees abroad, about 10 million internally displaced, and hundreds of thousands of military at the frontline
• Saying Ukraine “should have never started” this war, echoing Putin who said earlier “It was them who started the war in 2014. And we did not start this war in 2022”
• Justifying Russia’s atrocities in Ukraine by saying “Russia is capable of wiping out Ukrainian cities 100%, including Kyiv, but right now, they are only attacking at 20%”, ignoring the fact that tens of thousands of Russia’s missiles and Iranian drones have been barraging Ukrainian cities for three years.

To complete this surreal picture of the world where a US president is supporting an aggressor state in its unjustified invasion of the sovereign democratic country and demanding the invaded country to pay reparations to its former biggest military ally, it is worth adding that Russia, which started this war, might even end up with financial benefits from invading a neighbour.

It is hinting that it could agree to kindly accept two-thirds of the $300 billion worth of its frozen assets in Europe for reconstruction of those parts of Ukraine it has occupied. So, the US wants at least $500 billion from Ukraine, and Russia wants $200 billion from the EU, as well as the lifting of sanctions. What’s not to like?

Having said that, there is no doubt Trump and Putin will find common grounds at the meeting in Saudi Arabia on the 25th of February.

As for the safety of Ukraine, the message from Washington seems to be: who cares?

The initial versions of the “peace plan” spread during Trump’s campaign included at least some “security guarantees”, though excluding Ukraine’s NATO membership. But still a list of questions are unclear, like:

• What the “demilitarised zone” would include (would it be pegged at the actual frontline, or all Russia-occupied territories), who will patrol it and what its international status would be;
• Where the internationally recognised Ukraine-Russia border would be;
• What will happen to all those Ukrainian citizens, living under occupation, illegally imprisoned and tortured in the occupied territories, as well as to at least 19,000 of Ukrainian children abducted to Russia
• Who will ensure the human rights and Geneva Convention rules for Ukraine’s prisoners of war in the occupied territories and in Russia, as the International Red Cross Committee, UN Human Rights Council and other international bodies have successfully proven their incapability?

In the current situation, all those questions do not even seem to be on the agenda of the forthcoming Trump-Putin meeting. Meanwhile, negotiations about Ukraine are going on without Ukraine – as well as without the EU, left while two nuclear superpowers are deciding on what happens next on its borders.

There are moderate expectations that Trump would agree to let US’s naval vessels and aircraft patrol the demarcation line in exchange for placement of 30,000 European joint expeditionary forces military in Ukraine, far from the frontline, as Keir Starmer is going to offer. Soon, this might be too late and irrelevant.

Meanwhile, Russia is preparing not for peace but for continuing the war by forcing those mobilised in 2022 to sign permanent contracts. This is what betrayal looks like.

Nina Kuryata is Ukraine and defence editor at Tortoise media