Former President Joe Biden often declared during his administration that America and the world were “at an inflection point.” Putting aside his failings at coping with the inflection points in Afghanistan and Ukraine during his own administration, he would be right in saying we are at such a historic impasse now.
President Trump has just shocked most of the world — and generated exuberance in the Kremlin — by stunningly accusing Ukraine of starting the war with Russia. Trump declared that Ukraine is responsible for the massive Russia-inflicted death and destruction in its own country by refusing to “make a deal” with Vladimir Putin — that is, by not capitulating to Putin’s ultimatum that Ukraine surrender its independence and territorial sovereignty, cease to exist as an independent nation, and accept absorption into a restored Russian and neo-Soviet Empire.
Never mind that under that “peaceful” scenario, the vast majority of the population that still thinks of itself as Ukrainian would face the gruesome prospect already experienced by hundreds of thousands of their fellow citizens trapped in Russian-occupied parts of the country: repression, brainwashing, imprisonment, rape, torture, and execution.
It is not for nothing that the International Criminal Court has accused Putin and his forces of committing war crimes and crimes against humanity in occupied Ukraine and wanton destruction of hospitals, schools and other civilian facilities in areas still resisting Russia’s invasion.
Never mind also that Russia, along with the United Kingdom and the United States, signed the Budapest Memorandum in 1997, guaranteeing Ukraine’s political independence and territorial integrity in exchange for its surrender of Soviet-era nuclear weapons. Putin today demands also that Ukraine and the West abandon all hope of Ukraine ever exercising the right of all free nations to associate with other countries in collective security arrangements. Trump’s Defense Secretary, Pete Hegseth, last week ruled out NATO membership for Ukraine as “not realistic” despite years of explicit U.S. and NATO promises of Ukraine’s eventual accession. Trump has made clear that he agrees with Putin that the possibility of NATO membership justified Russia’s invasion.
Back in 2012, President Barack Obama promised Russia he would be “more flexible” after his reelection. In 2014, when Russia helped Bashar Assad use chemical weapons against Syria’s political opposition to stay in power despite Obama’s red line, and when Putin invaded Eastern Ukraine and Crimea, Obama kept his promise and did nothing.
When Putin openly prepared to invade Ukraine again in 2022, President Biden promised to impose economic sanctions on Russia and to help Ukraine. But he refused to send U.S. forces, establish a no-fly zone, or allow NATO allies to send the advanced weapons Ukraine needed to defend itself, to avoid starting “World War III.” On Biden’s watch, Ukraine did not fall and World War III did not erupt, but Ukraine was consigned to three years of a grueling war of attrition that cost hundreds of thousands of Ukrainian and Russian lives and massive destruction of critical infrastructure and historic cities.
Enter Trump, his special relationship with Putin, and his claim that the war would never have happened, had he been in power.
Trump is already demonstrating how he would have prevented the war — by taking Putin’s side and cutting off support for Ukraine.
He is right to demand that Europe do more for its own defense, but disastrously wrong to believe America’s withdrawal from the world can succeed.
Trump’s openly siding with an accused war criminal constitutes the greatest repudiation of Western values and collective security arrangements by any American president since World War II and the history of the Republic. If Congress and the courts allow it to stand, Trump can kiss his desire for a Nobel Peace Prize goodbye. Perhaps instead of being placed next to Washington, Jefferson, Lincoln and Teddy Roosevelt on Mount Rushmore, a Russian mountain will feature the carved images of Lenin, Stalin, Putin and Trump.
Trump is right that a little disruption to foreign relations can motivate allies to take their own self-defense more seriously. But if adversaries like China see divisions and openings in the West, they will surely exploit them. Trump’s Ukraine policy and the rewards it offers for Putin’s aggression simply opens too many doors for America’s enemies.
Joseph Bosco served as China country director for the secretary of Defense from 2005 to 2006 and as Asia-Pacific director of humanitarian assistance and disaster relief from 2009 to 2010. He is a nonresident fellow at the Institute for Corean-American Studies, a member of the advisory board of the Global Taiwan Institute and member of the advisory board of The Vandenberg Coalition.
