The art of the deal seems no match for the art of war – and the Ukrainians are proving that they understand both the enemy and their supposed friend in the White House.
Innovation, new tech, and deep strikes in the Russian heartlands are beginning to give Ukraine the edge in its long war with Russia.
However, one factor above all others has proved critical in freeing the Ukrainians to release the handbrake and strike directly at Vladimir Putin’s cities and war economy.
Donald Trump’s “allergy” to Ukraine and lack of interest in a war that he claimed he could end in 24 hours have given Kyiv a green light to expand the war on Ukrainian terms – and it is seizing the chance to strike.
Under the former president Joe Biden, the US administration was terrified that, if provoked, Putin would escalate the war, causing massive damage to the world economy – and to Biden’s chances of re-election. It fought to rein in Ukraine and limit strikes on Russian infrastructure and its biggest cities.
But the current President’s biases and laziness have led to him misunderstanding the changing nature of the conflict, according to experts. Meanwhile, his anti-Ukraine stance has weakened both his own and President Putin’s negotiating positions while simultaneously strengthening Ukraine’s relationship with Europe and allowing President Volodymyr Zelensky more military freedom. Now Nato allies are providing funding to offset the 99 per cent drop in US support since Trump returned to office.
Smoke rises from the area of the Russian oil producer Gazprom Neft’s Moscow oil refinery after a drone attack on 18 June (Photo: AFP via Getty Images)Trump’s “Ukraine allergy” goes back to 2019 and his first impeachment by Congress. Then, he was accused of using $400 million in military aid as leverage over Kyiv while seeking Ukraine’s help in undermining the campaign of presidential rival Biden, according to Orysia Lutsevych, deputy director of the Russia and Eurasia Programme and head of the Ukraine Forum at think-tank Chatham House.
“He doesn’t want to be reminded of this; it’s painful for him,” said Lutsevych. “Plus, we know Trump is not attentively reading all the intelligence reports on the conflict because he isn’t interested and he fundamentally doesn’t believe in Ukraine. He has basically withdrawn himself from any decisions on the war.”
The silver lining of Trump’s lack of interest is the newfound freedom this gives Ukraine on the battlefield and in the skies over Russian cities, allied with the ability to develop its own innovative missile and drone systems.
Lutsevych told The i Paper that “we are in a new phase of the war where Ukraine has the edge in innovation and where it can design a lot of the capabilities it needs, and Trump seems to have fundamentally misunderstood this shift in capability.”
President Zelensky has had to rebuild his relationship with Donald Trump after a rocky start and in the face of the US leader’s antagonism towards Ukraine. (Photo by Joe Raedle/Getty Images)‘Trump still imagines Russia as the unbeatable boxer from Rocky IV‘
Marc Devore, senior lecturer at the University of St Andrews’ School of International Relations and associate fellow at the Council on Geostrategy, an independent think tank, agrees that Trump is limited by his own biases – and compares his understanding of Russia to a character in a 1980s action movie.
“I don’t think that Trump is actually capable of accepting the idea that Ukraine could beat Russia. He seems to have an inbuilt bias that big countries with more resources have all the cards when it comes to war despite his own failure with Iran”, said DeVore.
“It seems to be this sort of mental rigidity that he has, and I think that Trump ceased seriously paying attention to Russia after Rocky IV came out. He still imagines Russia as Ivan Drago, the unbeatable Soviet super boxer.”
The Ukrainian ability to capitalise on Trump’s inattention has been amplified by the increasing sophistication and expertise of their armed forces and weapons manufacturers, believes William Freer, a research fellow in national security at the Council on Geostrategy.
“In the earlier stages of the conflict, the Ukrainians did not have the ability to conduct these kinds of strikes at range, and the long-range munitions they were eventually provided with by the US and others came with strict use conditions,” he told The i Paper.
“Those conditions probably haven’t changed much, but Ukraine has now developed the independent means to strike targets across Russia.”
But while Ukraine can strike Russian energy infrastructure and military targets, Moscow’s forces are returning fire with deadly barrages of missiles of their own, consistently hitting Kyiv and other Ukrainian cities.
A fire following a Russian missile strike on the Ukrainian capital of Kyiv on Monday (Photo: Eugene Kotenko / AFP via Getty Images)‘American disinterest is probably one of the best outcomes’
In the face of Russian attacks, and ahead of the Nato summit in Turkey this week, where world leaders will meet to discuss the conflict and wider plans to deter Russian aggression, President Zelensky once again urged Western powers to help.
“It is critically important that the world – first and foremost the United States and our European partners – come out of the Nato Summit in Ankara with strong decisions in support of our air defence, and thus the protection of ordinary people’s lives”, he wrote on Monday.
But it is a delicate balance for Ukraine and Zelensky to recapture Trump’s attention and convince him that backing Ukraine is in the long-term interest of America, while at the same time trying not to spook the US administration with fears that a cornered Putin would lash out at the West.
“The Americans have this entrenched fear that if the war really turned against Russia, Vladimir Putin would rather escalate than admit defeat”, argues DeVore.
He and Lutsevych each point out how Trump’s credibility withered following his repeated broken promises on Ukraine and his disastrous campaign against Iran.
Air defence systems are critical for both Russia and Ukraine as missile and drone technology and tactics become more sophisticated. (Photo: Nina Liashonok/Ukrinform/NurPhoto via Getty Images)“Look at how many agreements he makes where the deals don’t hold. The Americans may broker them, but then they walk away”, said Lutsevych, while DeVore added that “given how erratic and personalised Trump is, even if the Americans promised Patriots at the Nato summit, I don’t think anybody has high hopes that they will actually appear.”
And in the end, DeVore thinks the Ukrainian leadership may prefer Trump to stay out of the way, even if that denies them the critical air defences.
“Trump could try to swoop in and, for prestige reasons, be the person who negotiates a peace deal, but since Trump has even less leverage over the Russians than he has over the Ukrainians, him trying to quickly mediate generally involves threatening the Ukrainians,” he said.
“Or Trump could get spooked that Ukraine’s success could lead to Russian escalation and therefore he could try to stop Ukrainian progress altogether. So, if I were the Ukrainians, I would probably calculate that American disinterest in the conflict is probably the best of the possible outcomes.”
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