The US’ steadfast allegiance to Ukraine throughout that nation’s three-year warfare in opposition to Russia seems to be shortly disintegrating underneath the Trump administration. President Donald Trump on Feb. 19, 2025, known as Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy “a dictator” and falsely blamed him for the warfare that Russia initiated as a part of a land seize within the international locations’ border areas.
Zelenskyy, in the meantime, mentioned on Feb. 19 that Trump is trapped in Russian President Vladimir Putin’s “disinformation space.”
The intensifying bitterness comes because the U.S. and Russia began talks in Saudi Arabia, with out together with Ukraine, on how one can finish the battle.
The U.S. and Russia have lengthy been adversaries, and the U.S., up to now, has given Ukraine greater than US$183 billion to assist combat in opposition to Russia. However that funding got here when Joe Biden was president. Trump doesn’t look like equally inclined towards Ukraine.
Amy Lieberman, a politics editor at The Dialog U.S., spoke with Tatsiana Kulakevich, a scholar of Japanese European politics and worldwide relations, to grasp the implications of this sudden shift in U.S.-Russia coverage underneath Trump.
Kulakevich sees Trump’s strikes that might be perceived as self-interested as as a substitute a part of a calculated technique in preliminary discussions.
An airplane passenger reads a Monetary Occasions article about U.S. President Donald Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin on Feb. 19, 2025.
Horacio Villalobos Corbis/Corbis by way of Getty Photographs
Are you able to clarify the present dynamic between the U.S., Ukraine and Russia?
Individuals shouldn’t panic as a result of the U.S. and Russia are solely holding exploratory talks. We must always not name them peace talks, per se, at the very least not but. It was to be anticipated that Ukraine was not invited to the talks in Saudi Arabia as a result of there may be nothing to speak about but. We don’t know what the U.S. and Russia are literally discussing moreover agreeing to revive the conventional functioning of one another’s diplomatic missions.
Persons are perceiving the U.S. and Russia as being in love. Nonetheless, Trump’s Russia coverage has been extra hawkish than usually portrayed within the media. Trying on the file from the earlier Trump administration, we will see that if one thing just isn’t within the pursuits of the U.S., that’s not going to be finished. Trump doesn’t do favors.
He accepted anti-tank missile gross sales to Ukraine in 2019. That very same 12 months, Trump withdrew from the Intermediate-Vary Nuclear Forces Treaty, an settlement with Russia that restricted what weapons every nation may buy, over Russian violations.
In 2019, Trump additionally issued financial sanctions in opposition to a Russian ship concerned in constructing the Nord Stream 2 gasoline pipeline. These sanctions tried to dam Russia’s direct gasoline exports to Germany – this connection between Russia and Germany was seen by Ukraine as an financial risk.
Primarily based on Trump’s talks with Russia and remarks in opposition to Ukraine, it may appear to be the U.S. and Russia are not adversaries. How do you understand this?
There aren’t any clear indications that Russia and the U.S. have ceased to be adversaries. Regardless of Trump’s occasional use of phrases like “friends” in diplomacy, his rhetoric usually serves as a tactical maneuver relatively than a real shift in alliances. A key instance is his engagement with North Korea’s Kim Jong-un, the place Trump alternated between flattery and threats to extract concessions.
Even when the U.S. is assembly with Russia and the general public narrative appears to say in any other case, strategically, abandoning Ukraine just isn’t in the USA’ greatest pursuits. One purpose why is as a result of the U.S. turning away from Ukraine would make Russia completely satisfied and China completely satisfied. Trump has handled China as a main risk to the U.S., and China has supported Putin’s invasion of Ukraine.
U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio can also be nonetheless saying that everybody, together with Ukraine, might be on the desk for eventual peace talks.
The allegations that Russia was holding some data over Trump and blackmailing him began lengthy earlier than this presidential time period and didn’t cease Trump from imposing countermeasures on Russia throughout his first time period. The primary Trump administration took greater than 50 coverage actions to counter Moscow, primarily within the type of public statements and sanctions.
What does the U.S. acquire from creating a diplomatic relationship with Russia?
Trump is a transactional politician. American firms may revenue from the U.S. aligning with Russia and Russian firms, as some Russian officers have mentioned through the latest Saudi Arabia talks with the Trump administration. However the U.S. may additionally profit economically from the Trump’s administration’s proposed take care of Ukraine to present the U.S. half of Ukraine’s estimated $11.5 trillion in uncommon earth minerals.
Zelenskyy rejected that proposal this week, saying it doesn’t include the promise that the U.S. will proceed to present safety ensures to Ukraine.
Traditionally, because the Chilly Warfare, there was a diplomatic triangle between the Soviet Union – later Russia – China and the U.S. And there has all the time been one facet preventing in opposition to the 2 different sides. Trump making an attempt to develop a greater diplomatic relationship with Russia may imply he’s making an attempt to distance Russia from China.
An analogous dynamic is enjoying out between the U.S. and Belarus’ authoritarian chief, Alexander Lukashenko, a co-aggressor within the warfare in Ukraine. Lukashenko is shut with each Russia and China. The U.S. administration is seeking to calm down sanctions on Belarusian banks and exports of potash, a key ingredient in fertilizer, in alternate for the discharge of Belarusian political opposition members who’re imprisoned. There are over 1,200 political prisoners in Belarus. This U.S. overseas coverage technique is aimed toward offering Lukashenko with room to develop much less economically depending on Russia and China.
A employee clears snow from a cemetery in Kramatorsk, Ukraine, on Feb. 17, 2025. Greater than 46,000 Ukrainian troopers have died in fight since Russia launched a full-scale invasion in February 2022.
Pierre Crom/Getty Photographs
Is that this degree of collaboration between the U.S. and Russia unprecedented?
Whereas U.S.-Russia relations are sometimes outlined by rivalry, historical past reveals that pragmatic cooperation has occurred when each nations noticed mutual advantages – whether or not this pertains to arms management, house, counterterrorism, Arctic affairs or well being.
Furthermore, the U.S. has all the time prioritized its personal pursuits in its relationship with Russia. For instance, the U.S. and its allies imposed sanctions on Russia’s uranium and nickel industries solely in Could 2024, over two years after Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. This was as a result of United States’ strategic financial dependencies and considerations about market stability if it sanctioned uranium and nickel.
Even after Russia invaded Crimea – an space of Ukraine that Russia claims as its personal – in 2014 and offered help for Russian separatists in Ukraine’s Donbass area, the U.S. and different Western international locations imposed largely symbolic sanctions. This included freezing belongings of Russian people, limiting some monetary transactions and limiting Russia’s entry to Western expertise.
We must also discover that Trump in January 2025 promised to sanction Russia if it doesn’t finish the Ukraine warfare. The U.S. nonetheless has not eliminated any present sanctions, which alerts its dedication to a troublesome stance on Russia, regardless of perceptions of an in depth relationship between Trump and Putin.
Given Trump’s transactional method to overseas coverage, his robust rhetoric on Zelenskyy might be a deliberate negotiation technique aimed toward pressuring Ukraine into making larger concessions in potential peace talks, relatively than signaling abandonment.