Donald And His Comrade Vladimir

Things are moving forward slowly in the Ukraine conflict. There is now a tentative agreement between Trump, Putin, and Zelenskyy to a 30-day cease-fire against energy-producing targets—a very small step, but still a step.

This development has received the usual reporting from the American tribes. The Republicans see this as progress to end a bloody war that has cost Americans billions of dollars and killed or wounded a million combatants. The Democrats see a naïve Trump being manipulated by Putin into a bad deal. They say he is too friendly with Putin and that he foolishly admires and respects him. They also say Trump is a Russia lover who doesn’t care about Ukraine.

Trump is anti-war, based on his moral point of view. He also sees war as a waste of money and an event that interferes with economic progress. In this situation, Trump has to be careful not to concede too much for peace based on his emotional investment in ending the conflict. He has to be able to admit to himself that there may not be a solution that all parties find acceptable. Nevertheless, he looks at Putin as a strong adversary and likes dealing with strong people.

The left, because it opposes all things Trump, must oppose the peace process with the excuse that Trump won’t achieve peace in a way that benefits America. They are also on the side of the Europeans because they share the globalist/neoliberal ideology. The left has no power now, so they can’t help either Zelenskyy or the Europeans directly.

The Europeans themselves are the other problem, making the peace effort more complicated. The EU has always hated Trump because he opposes the globalist/neoliberal world they want to create. They despise nation-state actors like him as out-of-date dinosaurs. Their anger with Trump has increased since the election because of the threat of tariffs. Their economies are already in shambles because of the failure of neoliberalism, and now Trump is making it harder for them to recover.

They do not trust Putin and see Ukraine as the buffer between them and Russia. They would like the war to continue, and they are willing to support Ukraine directly.

This European hatred of Trump has created a positive outcome for the US. Europe now accepts the fact that their reliance on the United States for defense is no longer a sure thing, so they must fend for themselves. The EU is now allocating 800 billion Euros for the defense of Europe.

The Europeans also have the problem of their public, who are uneasy about immigration and economic inequality. Populist parties are gaining ground but are held back by the accusation that they are totalitarians in disguise. The clock is ticking on the globalists, however, and as soon as the populist parties learn how to sell themselves to the people, they will become stronger.

The NATO Pact’s Article 5 calls on every member to come to the aid of any member who an aggressor attacks. The Europeans are not interested in having Ukraine join NATO while it is at war with Russia because Europe would then be at war with Russia.

They have discussed extending Article 5 protections to Ukraine without it being a NATO member, however. This approach would be implemented after the current war is concluded. Putin would probably argue that Rule 5 without NATO membership is the same as NATO membership. Last week, the Europeans met to divvy up the role of peace-keeping force to be deployed in Ukraine. Putin has made it clear that a peace-keeping force is a non-starter for the negotiations.

We’re now in this weird Twilight Zone world where Trump is dealing with Putin directly while the Europeans are propping up Zelenskyy, promising weapons and whatever else he needs. The Europeans know that Putin considers them small fry and wants to deal only with Trump. That means that they are outside the main event, and Zelenskyy is available to them because he is also on the outside.

Some accuse Trump of taking some radical approach to the Ukrainian War. He is not. For the last one hundred years or more, there have been two philosophies of international politics: idealistic and realist. The idealistic view comes from the left and argues for equal participation of all the world’s countries in a global body.

This view was represented by the League of Nations utopianism of Woodrow Wilson and Roosevelt’s push for the creation of the United Nations. The realist view asserts that world stability depends on good relations between the most powerful nations, which today would be China, Russia, and the United States.

Theodore Roosevelt once said, “It would be a masterstroke if those great powers bent on peace would form League of Peace not only to keep the peace amongst themselves but to prevent by force, if necessary, it is broken by others.”

In 1971, President Nixon stated that there were five centers of economic power: the United States, the Soviet Union, Western Europe, Japan, and China.

On many occasions in American history, the United States and Russia (or the Soviet Union) have cooperated. This view resulted from the realization that power is power, and you have to have a direct relationship with the powerful to achieve peace. That’s why Biden not talking to Putin for three and a half years is so galling. Communication prevents misunderstanding.

Trump is not a Russia lover, but he knows that the road to peace travels through Putin.

You can apply either one of two maxims (or both) to this situation. Politics makes strange bedfellows, or the enemy of my enemy is my friend. Both Putin and Trump view “normal” societies as ones possessing traditional values: family community, faith, etc. The Europeans and the American left are in the opposing camp that wants to implement a “1984” globalist world and discard the traditions that mankind has lived by for 6000 years.

Putin and Trump might have more in common than Trump has with Europe.

Wrong Speak is a free-expression platform that allows varying viewpoints. All views expressed in this article are the author's own.