For one Trump is spectacularly famous for not being honest. He makes big bluffs and then backs down for minor concessions and it’s part of his bluster and bluff “negotiator businessman” persona.
But assuming this is on the table I think that it’s possible the plan lately has been to force Russia into a ceasefire. They’d give them most of the territories they’ve taken minus large chunks still held by Ukrainian forces. But importantly in a ceasefire the US would in backrooms push France, UK, etc to make good on their promises to send “peacekeeping forces” into Ukraine to support Ukraine the moment they had a ceasefire just as they’ve been promising repeatedly and confusing to do. If Russia refuses to play ball with this then the west may fear a collapse of its appearance of strength and be more willing to be antagonistic towards Russia.
I hope that Trump is foolish. I hope he shows Putin all his kindness and gestures were just attempts to get Russia back to the sucker’s position of accepting western control of most of Ukraine and an unstable peace that will obviously be used to re-arm Ukraine.
I guess the one hitch is I think there is a decent chance Trump as someone from the cold war era has a genuine dread and fear of nuclear weapons and nuclear war and if he thinks it may come to that I think he’ll blink, stick a knife in Europe’s back and hastily hop back over the Atlantic rather than letting it go off.
It’s interesting to note that Musk’s DOGE may have recently run into a snag. Reportedly Marco Rubio who is the neocon interest robot operating in the admin and in theory controls USAID under the State Department was feuding with Musk over the demands for cuts and Trump sided with Rubio, aka the old guard, aka the keep the imperialism machine functioning semi-competent neo-con manager side.
I think if the US thinks they can strong arm Russia economically than they’re absolutely delusional. It’s pretty clear that the west has already done all the sanctions they could think of over the past three years. There’s nothing meaningful left to sanction at this point. Meanwhile, Russian economy has only been getting stronger this whole time.
Personally, I expect that after doing a bit of huffing and puffing, the US will ultimately accept Russian terms here. The reality is that Ukraine is very obviously a sunk cost now, and the longer this goes on the worse things get for US. Trump will try doing a few stunts like this, but ultimately he needs the war to end.
It’s hard to parse things like this.
For one Trump is spectacularly famous for not being honest. He makes big bluffs and then backs down for minor concessions and it’s part of his bluster and bluff “negotiator businessman” persona.
But assuming this is on the table I think that it’s possible the plan lately has been to force Russia into a ceasefire. They’d give them most of the territories they’ve taken minus large chunks still held by Ukrainian forces. But importantly in a ceasefire the US would in backrooms push France, UK, etc to make good on their promises to send “peacekeeping forces” into Ukraine to support Ukraine the moment they had a ceasefire just as they’ve been promising repeatedly and confusing to do. If Russia refuses to play ball with this then the west may fear a collapse of its appearance of strength and be more willing to be antagonistic towards Russia.
I hope that Trump is foolish. I hope he shows Putin all his kindness and gestures were just attempts to get Russia back to the sucker’s position of accepting western control of most of Ukraine and an unstable peace that will obviously be used to re-arm Ukraine.
I guess the one hitch is I think there is a decent chance Trump as someone from the cold war era has a genuine dread and fear of nuclear weapons and nuclear war and if he thinks it may come to that I think he’ll blink, stick a knife in Europe’s back and hastily hop back over the Atlantic rather than letting it go off.
It’s interesting to note that Musk’s DOGE may have recently run into a snag. Reportedly Marco Rubio who is the neocon interest robot operating in the admin and in theory controls USAID under the State Department was feuding with Musk over the demands for cuts and Trump sided with Rubio, aka the old guard, aka the keep the imperialism machine functioning semi-competent neo-con manager side.
I think if the US thinks they can strong arm Russia economically than they’re absolutely delusional. It’s pretty clear that the west has already done all the sanctions they could think of over the past three years. There’s nothing meaningful left to sanction at this point. Meanwhile, Russian economy has only been getting stronger this whole time.
Personally, I expect that after doing a bit of huffing and puffing, the US will ultimately accept Russian terms here. The reality is that Ukraine is very obviously a sunk cost now, and the longer this goes on the worse things get for US. Trump will try doing a few stunts like this, but ultimately he needs the war to end.