On the face of it, President Trump is right to try to end a destructive war in Ukraine that is now approaching the three-year mark, and to open talks with Russia. This war has to end, and at this stage it can end expediently only through negotiations.
Yet the way the president is going about this vital task is misguided, counterproductive and unfair to Ukraine.
In quick order, Mr. Trump has sent his lieutenants to negotiate with Russia without the participation of either Ukraine or the NATO allies who are most directly threatened by a resurgent Russia; he has cruelly suggested that Ukraine — not Russia — is responsible for the war by not making some unspecified “deal” at the outset; he has demanded access to Ukraine’s mineral wealth as the price of continuing military support; and he has baselessly called Volodymyr Zelensky, the Ukrainian president, a “dictator without elections.”
In effect, Mr. Trump and his administration are pivoting U.S. foreign policy 180 degrees, pointing the way to a peace that would run counter to the American and Western mission of securing a sovereign, independent, democratic and prosperous Ukraine. It is a reversal of the past three years — since Russia invaded its neighboring nation, strong majorities of Americans of every party and persuasion have supported Ukraine — but also a repudiation of a nearly eight-decade core belief that the United States was safer in a world where it stood against aggression and authoritarianism and for freedom.
A lotta people are pointing to China as the inevitable winner of all of this, but your point about Europe using this lapse in U.S. soft power to make a move is salient. I’m a little bit worried about the rise of fascism in Europe though, doesn’t NATO-skepticism go hand-in-hand with Euro-skepticism? It feels just as likely that “Europe going alone” ends with a lot of nations going toward isolationary policies.