Ukraine May Be Trump’s Vietnam
Trump has no Henry Kissinger and will be alone in trying to fulfill the public's desire to end the war.
Last year, former President Donald Trump, whom current polls suggest will be president again in January, vowed of the Russia-Ukraine conflict: “I will have that war settled in one day, 24 hours.”
Voters now accustomed to Trump will forgive him for some advertising puffery. The statement, when taken with others Trump has made expressing the importance of Ukrainian survival and also stating, “I want everyone to stop dying,” indicate an appealing desire to negotiate an end to the war. That means preserving Ukraine in some form but understanding that the former Soviet republic is losing and the United States cannot continue an indefinite and dangerous proxy war with Russia.
Unfortunately, far from taking a day, ending the war could take up much of a second Trump term, consuming time and resources that ought to be spent addressing domestic problems or transforming the military to address threats from China, Iran, and our own hemisphere.
Surveys show that the American public is on Trump’s side. According to a Harris poll in February, 71 percent of Americans believe the United States should “help to negotiate an end to the Russia-Ukraine war.” Yet, few in Washington or European capitals grasp this necessity.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy actually signed a decree that bans negotiations with Russia. He has repeatedly stated a precondition of talks—not just a desired outcome—is the complete removal of Russian forces to pre-2014 borders. In other words, the side that is currently losing is demanding the winning side give up all its advances merely to talk. This precondition is unrealistic.
This approach also seems to be the Biden administration’s de facto plan supported uncritically by much of Congress. They are joined by a media, which, on both left and right, is heavily invested in its incorrect prediction that Ukraine would beat Russia and its hyping of Ukraine’s dubious relevance to definable U.S. national interests.
This political situation will be a problem for Trump. Recall the hysteria during the 2016 campaign and Trump’s early years in office when he merely said it would be a virtue for the leaders of the United States and Russia to be on good terms. After Trump’s 2018 summit with Russian President Vladimir Putin in Helsinki, Finland, both Democrats and Republicans had a meltdown when Trump said Putin told him Russia did not interfere in the 2016 election. Congressional Democrats tried to subpoena his translator, implying he secretly colluded with Putin. Trump was later impeached by pro-Ukraine zealots in Congress aided by operatives at the CIA and on the National Security Council staff. All signs indicate this hysteria would return.
Much can happen in Ukraine between now and when Trump would take office if he wins. The national security establishment and yellow press assured the public that the latest $61 billion for Ukraine would be decisive. Certainly, it should at least prevent Ukraine from losing, but military officials are already downplaying its ability to help Ukraine turn the tide against Russia. The chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, General Charles Brown, vowed on Friday to send a large number of NATO trainers—presumably many of them American—into parts of Ukraine, remarking, “We’ll get there eventually, over time.” This policy decision, which is not Brown’s to make, reflects the exact method by which the United States sleepwalked into the Vietnam War.
The similarity is apt. The problem facing Trump bears some resemblance to that faced by President Richard Nixon upon taking office in 1969. At the time, Nixon thought an American loss in Vietnam must be avoided to prevent serious damage to U.S. power globally. His national security advisor, Henry Kissinger, had a stronger sense of the hopelessness of the situation, and the risks of sapping American power in a sideshow war. Kissinger sought a “decent interval” between a U.S. withdrawal and the collapse of South Vietnam. Even then, it took years of negotiating and an escalation of air attacks against North Vietnamese forces to extricate the United States in 1973.
Like Nixon in Vietnam, Trump will not want a total collapse in Ukraine during his tenure, for which he would take much blame even if Biden and the national security establishment are the true culprits. However, it is far from certain if Trump can replicate a ceasefire in Ukraine that would achieve a Nixon-like freeing of Washington from a costly, losing sideshow.
Russia has a decreased incentive to negotiate if it is winning on the battlefield. Moscow will want full recognition of its conquests, removal of sanctions, and neutrality for what is left of Ukraine in exchange for halting its advance. Trump will want an arrangement, both in writing and in real-world practice, that decreases the odds Russia will resume hostilities in the future.
In order to achieve a battlefield stalemate by which both Russia and Ukraine would have an incentive to negotiate, Trump may have to follow Nixon’s example of escalating in order later to deescalate. However, achieving this would mean sending even more money and arms to Ukraine and increasing the risk of a war between NATO and Russia or Russian use of nuclear weapons. The big spenders in Congress are probably willing to fund escalation, but the public is already souring on largesse without success.
Trump also has no Kissinger. In his first term, Trump had no senior officials trying to help him find common ground with Russia. None shared his desire to stabilize relations with Russia and avoid pushing Moscow and Beijing together. Furthermore, presidents don’t usually negotiate the details of peace agreements themselves—the last to attempt to do so was Woodrow Wilson. The Paris Accords that ended U.S. involvement in Vietnam took years to achieve and Kissinger negotiated in secret much of the time. For a period, he made secret trips to France every weekend.
These activities would be difficult in today’s environment. All of Washington would have a meltdown over negotiations. Trump might take a year or more to settle on a competent negotiator and the Russians are in no hurry to cut a deal. No matter what outcome Trump achieved, he would be accused of selling out Ukraine.
But therein may lie the solution. If one is going to be judged guilty of something regardless of what one does, then why not achieve the upside of supposed misdeed? Who cares about the critics if they cannot be mollified? Consistent with this, Trump has a strong incentive to impose an agreement that accepts the reality on the battlefield and takes into account Russian security concerns, as well as those of Ukraine.
Freezing the conflict near today’s battle lines would preserve Ukraine minus its more ethnically Russian portions that Moscow has taken. NATO would be spared the humiliation of a Ukrainian military collapse. Dropping sanctions on Russia would decrease the cost of energy—and therefore the cost of just about everything—for Americans while Trump works again to increase U.S. energy production. It would also deflate efforts to undermine the dollar as the linchpin of the international financial system. Ukraine should be neutral but able to purchase the arms it needs for defensive purposes—assuming Europe provides the funds for this endeavor.
Making peace is often ugly. It would be so in Ukraine given what has transpired amid the unwise decision to fight a war of attrition against Russia of all places. But to avoid a second term dominated by Ukraine, Trump would need to move decisively in his first year, negotiate directly with Moscow or find the rare Republican who can do so, cut out the hostile national security apparatus, and reach a deal. It may be the most important thing Trump does since it will be necessary to preserve the rest of his would-be second term.
It might be over by Jan 20, 2025.