If the initial 28-plan program concocted
by the Trump- and Putin-led governments, which gave Russia nearly everything it
wanted in its war against Ukraine is any indication, the United States is on
the verge of selling out Ukraine and rewarding the naked aggression of Russia
against its neighboring country. Given the current occupant of the White House
this should surprise no one. When Russia initially invaded Ukraine in February
of 2022, then former President Trump declared the unprovoked act “wonderful.” There
is a long history of Trump’s involvement with Russia extending to the 2013 Miss
Universe Pageant in Russia and the machinations of his 2016 campaign manager,
Paul Manafort’s lobbying for Russian favored politicians in Ukraine. Trump’s
emissary to Ukraine, Rudy Giuliani acted to remove the highly acclaimed Marie Yovanovitch as Ambassador to
Ukraine because she obstructed efforts to get negative information on the
Biden’s during the spring of 2019 in anticipation of the 2020 Presidential
election.
Throughout his first
administration, President Trump sang the praises of Russian President Vladimar
Putin and issued nary a word against Russia’s military incursions into of
eastern Ukraine extending back to about 2014. While the precise source of
Trump’s admiration for Putin is unclear, it has remained persistent. Rather
than blaming accused international war criminal, Vladimar Putin for the war, he
put the onus on Ukraine for not making a deal that would have formally ceded Crimea
to Russia as well as eastern Ukrainian territories. The current plan devised by
Russia and the U.S. is rooted in the personal relation Trump has had with high
Russian officials extending over a decade.
Trump’s pro-Russian orientation
needs to be viewed in sharp contrast to that of his predecessor, President
Joseph Biden in the pivotal role he played in organizing a substantial
coalition of European powers to support Ukraine with massive military aid to
maintain that nation’s independence. President, Volodymyr Zelensky has led Ukraine
in a truly heroic battle against the Russian onslaught that with a consistent
U.S. policy across administrations could have resulted in an ultimate
reclamation of their territories in the east, with, perhaps, the proviso of establishing
an independent city in Crimea (taken in 2014) based on the outcome of a
legitimate referendum.
While the U.S. policy under Biden could
be critiqued over important details, in its broad framework, it was the right stance
not only for Ukraine, but for the defense of democracy throughout eastern
Europe, which would have been severely threatened with a Russian victory in
2022. Trump’s conceit is based on his unrelenting desire to radically upend
Biden’s policy by pulling the U.S. out of its leadership role in supporting the
right of Ukraine to maintain its own independence against the colonial
aggrandizement of Russia. It is also reflected in President Trump’s disdain of
Europe’s continuing support of that beleaguered nation and his obsession to
legitimize Russia under Putin in his dismissal of its war of aggression against
its neighbor as of no account that matters.
The sad reality is that without
vigorous U.S. support at the helm, it is unlikely that the European powers could
exert the capacity to continue to support Ukraine’s defense against the
juggernaut from the east. The initial 28-point plan concocted between Russia
and the U.S., has been, in part modified due to the persistence of Ukraine and
its European partners to push back against it. However, so long as Trump leads
the U.S. towards a plan that cedes to Russia substantial territories in eastern
Ukraine and other intolerable concessions, the reality on the ground speaks to
inevitable limiting conditions. In a best-case scenario, New York Times
columnist, Tom Friedman refers to the need to accept a “dirty” as opposed to a
“filthy deal,” which would have been something like the 28-point plan, as
discussed.
The “dirty deal” would allow Russia
to keep the current territory it has stolen from Ukraine. In Friedman’s
scenario, the European nations and the U.S. would provide an iron-clad
guarantees for Ukraine’s security. In my enlargement on Friedman’s parameters,
there would be no limitation on the size of its army; in addition, Ukraine
would possess the right to join the European Union, and reparations would be drawn
from Russian resources to rebuild its war-torn infrastructure.
The dirty deal may be the best
outcome given current political realities and even that would be a tough sell
under the present circumstances. However, that would not have been the case if
Trump had the intellectual competence, wisdom, and humility to build on Biden’s
leadership to place unified, maximum pressure against Russia’s immoral invasion.
Such a policy could have been sharpened under a Trump administration singularly
poised on pushing Russia out of Ukraine.
In rejecting this vision, the Trump
administration is not only on the verge of jeopardizing the independence and
integrity of Ukraine and betraying its alliance with Europe. It is rewarding
Russia for its brutal war of aggression and legitimizing Putin, who by all
rights, should be hauled to the Hague and tried as the international war
criminal that he is.
If there is ever a query as to who
lost Ukraine, we will know where the blame lies. While the shame would rightly
belong to the Trump administration for this craven betrayal, the stain of
promises made and promises broken will remain on the United States of America for
a good, long time.
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