Diverging Goals in Ukraine

By Krišjānis Kariņš, former Prime Minister of Latvia, now Senior Advisor at KREAB Brussels

After more than 3 1/2 years of Russia’s flat-out war of aggression against Ukraine, the US president is now seriously making an attempt to end the war and come to a peace. This is generally very good news. As the world’s strongest military power, the US has the potential to force a deal. Unfortunately, to date president Trump has used his power mostly to pressure Ukraine, the country which is being attacked by Russia. He has been surprisingly soft on Russia, although he has at times threatened that country as well. Indeed, the US president’s vacillations in his approach have caused consternation in many quarters.

The root challenge is that currently Russia, Ukraine, and the United States appear to each have a different goal. European countries, which have been relegated mostly to the sidelines, are closely aligned with Ukraine, and remain dependent upon the US for security. The dynamic between these four players in the field will ultimately determine the outcome of the war and the security situation not only in Ukraine, but throughout Europe for the foreseeable future.

Russia

Putin’s goal in starting the war in the first place was to liquidate Ukraine as a sovereign country. This goal has not changed. He is not acting on a whim, but on an (albeit twisted) ideology that claims that Ukraine does not exist, and that it is a part of and belongs to Russia. In effect, good old-fashioned imperialism. The fact that the Ukrainian people want to join the EU and NATO is anathema to Putin, who is bent on stopping this, regardless of the cost. As Trump – led negotiations take shape, Putin has benefitted tremendously so far. At the Alaska summit he literally got the “red carpet” treatment from Trump, which publicly ended his international isolation imposed by the collective west since the start of the all-out war. To top it off, Putin has not had to concede anything so far. He continues not only his military attacks along the front line, but also his nightly areal bombardments of civilians throughout Ukraine. Nothing indicates that Putin feels compelled to end the war. He seems to be playing for time by acknowledging that negotiations are necessary, while at the same time continuing all-out in his war efforts.

Ukraine

Zelensky, on the other hand, is fighting for the very survival of his country. The Ukrainians have been remarkably successful in resisting Russian aggression, albeit with a vast amount of western aid. Indeed, the war is into its fourth year and various analysts place overall Russian casualties at over 1 million, yet Putin still has not conquered Ukraine. Alas, the Ukrainians have also suffered many casualties, including women and children who have been suffering mass attacks on civilian infrastructure inflicted by the Russians. It is conceivable that Zelensky could agree to some sort of ceasefire or even peace along the current front line, as long as there would be some very strong security guarantees for ensuring that Putin would not rest, rearm, and continue his attack at some point in the future. It is pointless to expect that Zelensky or any other Ukrainian leader would legally concede any occupied territory to be a part of Russia. Indeed, this would be a dangerous precedent for the rest of Europe, and indeed for countries around the world, for it would justify taking territory by force.

The United States

For Trump, the clear goal is to end the war. The president has dispatched Steve Witkoff, a longtime friend and New York real estate developer, to be the “point man” in the negotiations. Tellingly, Mr. Witkoff does not have any diplomatic experience, and his grasp of the history of the region is open to question. By circumventing “traditional” routes of international negotiations (such as using the State department and various intelligence agencies to prep the ground), Trump apparently believes that his personal charisma and agreements on territory will persuade Putin to give up his war. As a real estate developer, he views the conflict in terms of land which could somehow easily be “swapped” for the right price. It seems doubtful that Trump would apply this logic if Florida were under attack, but that is besides the point. All actions so far indicate that Trump is bent on ending the war, and is less sensitive to what the “cost” of peace would mean to the Ukrainians.

Europe

The war has highlighted how dependent on the United States European countries currently are for their security. 80 years of US military dominance in Europe has left its mark. The public deference shown to the US president indicates the extent of the dependency. The continent is indeed an extremely wealthy trading block, but it lacks political coherence. While the EU has institutionalised cooperation among its 27 member states, it is not a federal country, and lacks a federal finance ministry and army. It has no common “commander in chief” analogous to the US president. This allows Trump to act unilaterally when dealing with Putin, forcing European leaders to scramble to try to influence his thinking about Ukraine and Russia. Although European countries within NATO are now committed to vastly expanding their investments into defence up to 5% of GDP, Europe is still years away from having truly capable militaries. What is positive is that under pressure from both Putin and Trump, European leaders, including Great Britain, are now rallying together and working in a very coordinated manner to both support Ukraine with arms and money, as well as working closely with Trump to keep the transatlantic bond as tight as possible.

The future

Currently all eyes are on Trump. Given the size of the US economy and its military, he has the ability to force an outcome. As of yesterday, Trump publicly claims that he has not yet decided who is to blame for the war still going on. If he decides that it is Putin, one could expect stronger sanctions to try to force Russia to the negotiating table. If he decides that it is Zelensky (say, for not conceding territory to the aggressor), he could conceivably stop all US support for Ukraine, leaving it up to the Europeans to find the means to support Zelensky both financially and militarily. The fact that the US president is (publicly) undecided shows just how massively US foreign policy has shifted since January. Taking into consideration how Trump’s views have been shifting back and forth, it is possible that no clear decision will be taken by the US for some time. This means that for the foreseeable future, the fighting will rage on in Ukraine.

For Ukraine and Europe, the lesson in all of this is that they must be prepared for a future where the US would no longer be playing a meaningful role in terms of their security. As vice-president JD Vance recently stated, the US is “done with the funding of the Ukraine war business”. Already, US military support has come to mean that Europeans buy US weapons and then provide them to Ukraine. European countries are currently negotiating with the US about post-war security guarantees for Ukraine, and some countries have offered to place their own “boots on the ground” as part of a deal that would crucially include the US in some meaningful capacity. As the US becomes more and more ambiguous regarding its will to support Ukraine and European defence as such, the ball really falls into Europe’s court. If Europe stays united, it could take over the primary responsibility for maintaining peace in Europe once the war in Ukraine is somehow ended. In the mean time, an aggressive Russia will continue its war to expand its borders as far as it can.