For the first time in its 250 years, America is in a de facto alliance with a dictator waging a war of conquest against a neighbour, with President Donald Trump’s unprecedented steps to aid Vladimir Putin’s bloody invasion of Ukraine.
For a president who loves to falsely claim history-making achievements, it’s an accomplishment that will actually make the history books.
“We haven’t. Ever,” said Robert Kagan, a top US State Department official in Ronald Reagan’s White House, who is now with the Brookings Institution, adding that a comparable scenario would have been President Franklin Roosevelt siding with Hitler or Stalin in 1939. “Mind-boggling that we have a president in this position.”
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In the past two weeks, Trump has lifted economic sanctions to let Vladimir Putin’s Russia resume making money selling oil products and undermined other sanctions he signed into law only weeks earlier.
His administration has throttled a satellite communications system Ukraine had been using to defend against Putin’s nightly attacks, leading to the deaths of at least hundreds of innocent civilians.
And, according to Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, he is now reneging on the delivery of anti-missile interceptors.
“I believe steps have been taken to convince Ukraine to capitulate,” Zelenskyy told Bloomberg News on Sunday.
Trump’s White House did not respond to HuffPost queries about Trump’s open attempts to help Russia, which, in contrast to his various claims of “historic” accomplishments, truly mark an American first.
Trump himself, while continuing to claim that all he wants is an end to the war, lashed out at Zelenskyy to reporters on Monday when told that the Ukrainian president had said Trump was on the “wrong side of history.”
“Zelenskyy doesn’t know what he’s talking about. Zelenskyy is a man that should have had this war settled a long time ago,” he said and then repeated his suggestion that Ukraine should have rewarded Putin for his invasion by ceding territory, even though Russia has been unable to take more than a modest amount of Ukrainian soil despite nearly five years of war.
“They’re losing their male population,” Trump said of Ukraine as he left the White House for yet another pre-midterm rally. “Ukraine could have had this thing settled a long time ago. If he would have listened to me … he would have had this settled a long time ago. Maybe it’s time for Zelenskyy to get somebody else to negotiate.”
Trump’s sudden turn against Ukraine after months of adopting a more neutral position in the conflict comes after an October 9 phone call with Putin in which the pair struck a deal to export Russian diesel to the United States.
The Wall Street Journal reported Putin used the call to float a post-midterms summit where Putin, Trump and Chinese leader Xi Jinping ― but not Zelenskyy ― would negotiate an end to the war.
On Sunday, Trump spelled out his rationale for taking Putin’s side in a social media post. “Russia is doing very little, if anything, to help the Islamic Republic of Iran, compared to what they could be doing, and I want to keep it that way,” he wrote and then, again, falsely accused Zelenskyy of hurting American farmers, truckers and others suffering from higher diesel fuel costs through his targeting of Russian oil refineries.
In fact, the higher costs for diesel as well as every other type of petroleum product have resulted from Trump’s war of choice against Iran, industry experts agree.
Fiona Hill, a Russia analyst who served on Trump’s first-term National Security Council, said Trump’s statement reeks of weakness and called it an extraordinary public admission for an American president.
“Trump has laid it out, how fearful he is of Putin, how weak he is,” she said. “It’s a shocking act of betrayal, honestly…. Putin is seeing the moment and thinking this is perfect.”
Illinois Democratic Senator Dick Durbin was among two dozen members of Congress from both parties who participated in a Monday call with Zelenskyy.
“While Trump’s oil handouts to Vladimir Putin undermine the war effort, I made clear on our call that Congress is determined to support the brave Ukrainian people in their fight for freedom,” Durbin said in a statement.
“I showed the horrifying photos from the scene, a child killed in a stroller,” Zelenskyy wrote on social media afterward. “This is how Russia responds to sanctions waivers and reduced pressure.”
While Trump’s new, openly pro-Putin stance has alarmed both Russia experts and lawmakers, it has been celebrated in Russia by pro-Putin media.
Kirill Dmitriev, Putin’s envoy in discussions with Trump representatives Jared Kushner and Steve Witkoff, reposted an image of an American bald eagle and a Russian bear squaring off against a lion representing the United Kingdom and the European Union. Dmitriev added the word: “together.”
Trump and his White House frequently call his actions “historic” even though they are not. Trump constantly called his 2016 election victory “historic” without offering any explanation as to why. Trump calls his 2024 victory both historic and a “landslide” — though he did not even win a majority of the votes cast.
He similarly claims that he has overseen a historic increase in foreign investment in the United States. The $21 trillion figure he cites, however, is entirely fictitious.
Kagan said the timing of Trump’s open alliance with Putin again raises questions as to what leverage the Russian dictator might have against him, considering Trump seems to be antagonising more hawkish, anti-Putin members of his own party only weeks before the midterm elections.
“Why pick that fight with his own party at this moment? Putin, on the other hand, has every reason to want Trump to do all this before the election, before he may become a lame duck,” Kagan said.
“The answer may go to whatever lies at the core of Trump’s relationship with Putin. Could be friendship, except neither of these guys has friends. So maybe it’s something else. Who can say?”
