Europe’s strategic interest requires this as never before
Under armed attack from Putin and pushed into the corner of the ring by Trump’s aggressive ultimatum – this is the bare reality that Ukraine is facing.
In less than a week, Kyiv should cede to Moscow, at Washington’s request, much more than Russia has been able to wrest from Kyiv in almost four years of war.
As if that were not enough, the future of Ukrainians becomes even bleaker if the current war were to end on the terms imposed by the American president.
At least this is what results from the 28-point plan discussed exclusively between the Russians and the Americans, since it is not clear anywhere that Russia will be unable at some point to resume the invasion of Ukraine from the point where the current one will have stopped.
- This because, according to the provisions of the Trump-Putin plan:
- Ukraine’s Army will be reduced – in terms of numbers of men and in terms of equipment.
- Formidable defensive positions in the unoccupied Donbas would be ceded by Kiev under Moscow’s control. It is, therefore, clear who loses strategic advantage and who acquires strategic advantage.
- The NATO umbrella will not exist for Ukraine.
- There’s not even a question of a slightly weaker umbrella, given that the presence of foreign troops will not be on the ground to maintain peace.
- The security guarantees offered by the US, at least in the publicly presented form of the US document, pale in comparison. Add to this the lack of trust that Trump has cultivated among America’s traditional allies in Europe and Asia, through public statements in which he relativized the solidity of the commitments assumed by the US, as well as through recent withdrawals of American troops from some European countries, including Romania. Or through the periods in which, and before arriving at the White House, and after settling there, Trump blocked key funding overnight for military aid to Ukraine, but also deliveries of equipment and information sharing.
- History shows us:
- Russia has repeatedly demonstrated that when it wants to invade, it does not stumble over formalities. This happened in the USSR era, but it also happened on February 24, 2022, when Moscow violated the Budapest Memorandum, signed in 1994. By virtue of that document, Russia is one of the guarantors of the territorial integrity and sovereignty of independent Ukraine, in exchange for Kyiv giving up the nuclear arsenal inherited from the time of the Soviet Union. If international agreements could not stop the Kremlin from attacking a neighboring country, why would domestic legislation do so?
- Moreover, in its military interventions across borders, Putin’s Russia has not exclusively used the regular army. Mercenaries have also played a key role in Ukraine, and in Syria, and in Africa and elsewhere. And the existence of mercenaries, speaking of the above point, is forbidden by Russian law!
- Russia has demonstrated, during these almost four years of war, that it says one thing and another does in terms of its will to end the war. Donald Trump was personally a serial victim of this old Moscow method of deceiving interlocutors.
- Finally, on the eve of Trump’s aggressive ultimatum to Ukraine, Putin appeared in military uniform, somewhere at a command point of the Russian army. Given the attention paid to the choreography in the case of his public appearances, as well as the major role of symbolism in Russian diplomacy, it is clear that the Kremlin dictator’s mind is not set on eternal peace.
In this context, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky addressed his nation on Friday.
It was his most dramatic public intervention, comparable only to the drama and extraordinary significance of his first one at the beginning of the invasion, made directly from the streets of Kyiv, when he announced that the president and the country’s leadership would not flee, but would stay to fight.
As on February 24, 2022, the nature of the circumstances forced Zelensky to acquire exceptional diplomatic skills in order to be able to win the West’s support for the Ukrainian cause.
Since January 20 and, more specifically, after the calamitous moment in the Oval Office, a month later, Zelensky has acquired increasingly effective skills to communicate with Donald Trump.
This could also be seen on Friday, when he kept a measured tone, continued to be constructive and did not hesitate to express appreciation for the peaceful efforts of the leader in the White House, despite the hostile nature of the American presidential approach to Ukraine.
Zelensky needs to keep a cool head like he needs air, despite the injustice to which Washington subjects Kyiv, because there is no room for further hostility of his narcissistic, rudimentary and capricious American counterpart.
And yet, Zelensky, although civilized and balanced, in places was surgical and forceful, and above all perfectly legitimate:
- He did so by suggesting that Trump had forced Ukrainians to choose between mutually exclusive options — dignity or the support of an essential partner (albeit a diluted support from the start). The blackmail to which Ukraine is exposed was suggested in a post in the words of its president, since the dignity and support of the essential ally mutually exclusive: either one or the other.
- He also did it by suggesting the way to his compatriots, when, saying that America is waiting for the answer, he immediately added that he personally had already given it in 2019, when he took the oath: “I undertake by all my actions to defend Ukraine, its sovereignty and independence, to protect the rights and freedoms of citizens, to respect the Constitution and the laws of Ukraine, to fulfill my obligations in the interest of all my compatriots and to raise the prestige of Ukraine in the world.”
- None of these words I think suggest that Zelensky is intending to lose his dignity in order to keep the help of his American ally, under these conditions. A little further on, he explicitly stated it: “I will fight so that, from all points of the plan, at least two are not missing: the dignity and freedom of Ukrainians.” So, Zelensky has already chosen and he has chosen dignity. But he needs both his people and the armed forces to clearly express the direction they are opting for.
- Finally, “we do not make noisy statements,” the Ukrainian president also said, thus drawing a clear, but civilized, line of separation between him and his counterpart in Washington.
But what Zelensky said, although essential, is not enough. Two more interventions are needed: from his fellow citizens and from European allies who have in 2025 compensated for the gaps abandoned by the Trump administration in supporting Ukraine and fighting Russia.
As the deadline imposed by the US on Ukraine to respond is implausibly tight, the reaction of the Ukrainian people and its armed forces will come in the coming hours and days. We will also see clearly how strong European reactions are.
One thing is certain: Trump’s plan not only sacrifices the sacrifice made by Ukrainians so far and the support offered to them by allies, including the US, but it will make the future more dangerous through the benefits offered to Russia. For it reinforces Moscow’s intimate and unshakable conviction that war remains the miracle solution, invasions are rewarded, and borders are for fools.
Donald Trump is playing tougher than ever this time. But Donald Trump can still be turned back or at least made to take some steps backwards. It happened to him every time with Russia, it happened to him so many times with China. It has even happened to Europe.
Europeans must not forget this and Ukrainians must do the same.
More than ever, it is in the interest of both sides to immediately take Ukraine out of the corner of the ring and adopt a new, infinitely bolder stance towards the White House from now on – one that will convince Trump’s America never again to dare to do as it does now.
