Since he promised during his election campaign to quickly end the war in Ukraine, the Ukrainian President And his European allies were worried about what that might mean.
This week their fears were confirmed. Almost a month after Trump’s duties, the policy that follows is now emerging – and does not include Ukraine or Europe.
At the same time, the US Vice -President Jay Di VanceFrom Munich, Germany, instead of clarifying the Trump plan as the Europeans expected, he accused them, who seems ready to accept the Trump plan, but asked Vance guarantees for Ukraine’s security.
Last Wednesday the Russian President Vladimir Putin He noted his most important diplomatic success in the three -year war: he spoke by phone with Trump who, without coordinating the details with Kiev in advance, broke the years of silence between the Oval Office and the Kremlin.
The call, which lasted for almost one and a half hours, offered the first outline of Trump’s vision for a peace deal, with himself focusing on the terms that are most interested in Russia, offering significant concessions to Putin before the negotiation officially begins.
Putin’s aspirations
The Russian president has been seeking for years to prevent Ukraine from joining NATO, and now this possibility seems to be not even a negotiating paper.
At the same time he had long expressed his desire to negotiate about Ukraine’s future directly with Washington and, as the world community said, Putin hoped to leave the White House Joe Biden And to succeed Trump.
The phone call of the two leaders had preceded equally surprise statements by the US Secretary of Defense Pitt HegshethEarlier on Wednesday to his European counterparts in Brussels, where, to the surprise of others, he explicitly and for the first time that Ukraine had to abandon its ambitions to join NATO and accept territorial losses, while lifting the weight of security guarantees. Europe.
The Trump Plan for Peace, as it shows so far, is likely to turn Ukraine into a neutral area between Russia and the EU, with its sovereignty in question and under the permanent threat of Russian expansionism, while the US will exploit resources. her (rare land).
European media are talking about “betrayal”, ‘Ukrainian sale’ and “New Munich” (Referring to the 1938 agreement with which the allies gave part of Czechoslovakia to the Nazis).
So Europe suddenly realizes that Washington intends to close this chapter soon by making great concessions to Russia, which involve the remodeling of European borders and that then the reconstruction account – at least 486 billion euros in the next decade, according to With the World Bank – as well as for the guarantee of post -war security, it will only be borne by Europe.
Indeed, they will take advantage of Ukraine’s rare lands, as Trump demands.
“Humiliation”
Although almost all of the above have been hovering as a possibility for weeks, they have caused turmoil in European capitals. The British “Guardian” and the French “Monde” explain that it is Europe’s “humiliation”, which was not sufficiently prepared for Trump’s return to power.
Since Wednesday, others less and others more. Yesterday, Friday, the French President Emmanuel Macron said that “Peace in the form of capitulation is bad news for everyone.”
The most angry answer however came from Kayathe new leader of the EU foreign policy and a former president of Estonia. ‘Why do we give (ed. to Russians) Everything they want before the negotiations even start? It is a disgust » stated.
The US Vice President Vance, who opened the Safety Conference in Munich yesterday, was expected to clarify the Trump Peace Plan for Ukraine but avoided the issue and, instead, angered Europeans by criticizing them for ‘Retreat of freedom of expression’ and by calling them ‘To change the rails’ In, such as the (far -right) alternative to Germany (AfD).
President Trump’s choice to “restore” Putin internationally, bypassing Kiev and Brussels at the same time on the phone call with the Russian president of the Ukrainian is an example of American unilateralism. President Biden was tactically close to coordinating with Ukrainian leaders.
Trump, on the other hand, not only first spoke to Putin and then called on Zelenski to inform him, but also expressed his warm words about the Russian president, stating that ‘Wish Peace’ And that he has to return to the G7 (formerly G8 before Russia was eliminated in 2014 due to the annexation of Crimea) while referring to an imminent meeting in Saudi Arabia to discuss the Ukrainian – without Ukraine.
