With the Russian economy slipping, the new president of the United States threatens from different directions: sanctions, tariffs and lowering the price of oil are some of the Kremlin’s nightmares
abruptly changed rhetoric regarding peace talks in , after several months of pressuring Kiev to make concessions before taking office. After months of suggesting that he would be able to make peace in record time – 24 hours was his first promise -, the new American president gave the Kremlin an ultimatum and experts believe that Ukraine could end up seeing its position reinforced by cause of that.
“Putin is a man firmly committed to rebuilding an empire and shows no signs of wanting to give up on that. Therefore, the United States will have to strengthen the Ukrainian position until it can begin to think about reaching a peace agreement. Trump begins to realize this, it is inevitable. Vladimir Putin only knows one language, which is that of force. Therefore, Ukraine could receive much more military aid than it received with Joe Biden”, says Major General Isidro de Morais Pereira.
The new American president wasted no time in toughening his rhetoric towards the Kremlin. A few days after taking office, Donald Trump announced what, in practice, is an ultimatum for the Kremlin. Either Vladimir Putin gives in and agrees to negotiate a peace agreement with Ukraine, or the United States “will have no choice” but to significantly increase “taxes, tariffs and sanctions” against Russia. “We can do this the easy way or the hard way – and the easy way is always the best way,” said the president on his social network Truth Social.
Moscow showed an unusual lack of will to react. The first voice to respond to Trump was the deputy ambassador to the United Nations, Dmitry Polyanskiy, who said that “it is not merely about ending the war” and that it is necessary to understand what “the agreement” suggested by the American president means. Shortly afterwards it was the turn of Dmitri Peskov, Kremlin spokesman, who said he saw “nothing new” in Trump’s rhetoric, recalling that during his first term “sanctions were a method used” by the American president against Russia.
Ukraine was the one who liked what they heard. Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha said Trump’s words were a “strong signal” that President Trump will be able to create “a new dynamic” diplomacy that will allow Kiev to put an end to the war. However, experts suggest that it is necessary to be cautious regarding Trump’s position, and it is necessary to wait until the American administration takes concrete measures.
“Everyone thought that Donald Trump would force Ukraine into a ceasefire that was not favorable to Ukraine and what happened seems to have been the opposite. Perhaps sensing the weakness of Putin, who has internal problems, Donald Trump will have felt that he cannot let Ukraine fall. We have to see what Trump will do”, says Manuel Serrano, a specialist in European affairs and international politics.
On the first day of his term, while signing an “avalanche” of executive orders, Donald Trump had made the first critical comments on the Russian side, highlighting that he did not know if Putin really wanted to jump to the negotiating table. “He can’t be very enthusiastic, he’s not doing very well,” he told journalists, referring to Putin’s war. “Russia is bigger, it has more soldiers to lose, but that is no way to govern a country”, especially because the country’s economy “is falling”.
“Trump speaks with a lot of exaggerations, hyperbolizes, always shows himself to be very capable. It happens with all oppositions, showing themselves to be better than the government itself. Right now, what we have is Trump changing his language style and talking about Putin as someone who could also be sanctioned”, says Orlando Samões, an international relations specialist.
And there are signs that the new American administration’s main focus of pressure will be through a more focused attack on the Russian economy. The Russian president has shown that he is increasingly concerned about the state of his economy. The sanctions imposed by the West continue to hamper Russian access to different components, significantly intensifying inflation in the country, at a time when there are fewer and fewer workers and a great demand in the labor market. All this at a time when the Russian Central Bank is trying to curb the rise in the cost of living through a 21% interest rate, which makes credit increasingly difficult for Russian businesspeople to pay back.
According to defense think tank the Institute for the Study of War, the Kremlin has launched an information campaign to “create a false impression” that the Russian economy is performing better than reality. The macroeconomic data “directly contradicts the Kremlin’s claims” that the Russian economy is “performing well.”
According to recent news, Putin expressed his discontent with the drop in private investment due to the high cost of credit. This at a time when the country is spending 6.3% of GDP on Defense. An increase in US economic sanctions could have an even more serious impact on the Russian economy if it is focused on one of the main sources of revenue for the Russian budget: the hydrocarbon industry.
“Donald Trump has already been clear: either Putin agrees to sit at the table or he will face more sanctions. The sanctions are beginning to worry Russia, so much so that the Kremlin has already launched a campaign to hide the bad situation in which the Russian economy finds itself. Interest rates are at 21% and inflation is more than double digits”, insists the major general.
Donald Trump took advantage of the Davos meeting to threaten a strong attack against the Russian oil industry. Speaking before some of the most powerful men in the world, Donald Trump stated that if the OPEC countries lowered the price of oil “the war would end immediately”, stressing that Russia is only able to maintain its war effort due to the high price. at which the barrel of oil is being sold. OPEC countries, a group of 12 oil-producing nations, are responsible for 30% of the oil on the market.
“Trump is starting to realize that he doesn’t have the leverage he thought he had under Vladimir Putin. Donald Trump had the perception that his word to the Kremlin could be decisive, but he ran into reality. Russia is signaling that it is not giving up on its maximalist goals in Ukraine and this will result in an attempt to strengthen the Ukrainian position by the new administration. Trump could even open the way for the sending of long-range weapons such as Tomahawk missiles”, says Major General Isidro de Morais Pereira.
