And it finally happened... Trump decided to cut (officially "pause") the aid to Ukraine, not just the future aid, but the aid that had already been pledged.
The president has been clear that he is focused on peace. We need our partners to be committed to that goal as well. We are pausing and reviewing our aid to ensure that it is contributing to a solution, the White House official said.
Well, pausing in this context is quite a strong measure, as it is simple to stop, but takes time to put in place. This breaks the Budapest agreement from the US - which anyway had been broken in 2014 and makes it clear for everyone to see that the new US does not mind allie or foe, treaty or not, word given or not.
Well, this is the new US, no second level thinking about what this means for the future, all about here and now and "deals". The world will adapt and where there is no trust in reputation and deals, everything becomes about the here, now, armies and "deals".
I think big favours call to big Thank$$$, so Putin must be preparing the checkbook.
But not all is lost, Europe is ramping up support and Ukraine is far from being defenceless, so no, the war does not stop here.
Meanwhile the US indexes have gone free fall after the tariffs in Mexico and Canada take full effect. No more pause, nothing...
Canada has decided to limit their export of electric power to several norhtern estates. Mexico has less of a hold, but there is no way the US comes better-off. It is a loose loose situation, which Trump expects to win by... loosing less than others I am guessing.
The news is about the failed Zelensky-Trump meeting. JD Vance started playing the "wise knowitall" with stupid comments that sound nice but are crap and that actually helped visualise the problem.
One of the Kremlin red lines seems to be leaving Ukraine defenceless - AKA without security guarantees.
The US considers that the fact that they have economic interests in Ukraine is enough to stop Putin. However, Zelensky, that at this point knows more than anyone about Ruzzian "diplomacy", has pointed out that there were already tens of US companies doing business in Ukraine and that did not stop Putin.
There is a need to accept that complying with international treaties for Ruzzia is just "optional". The way to secure peace is to make sure that Ruzzia clearly sees that attacking may risk - not their people, not their industry, not their weapons - but their leadership, in first person. That can only be achieved with a wide trusted alliance that clearly commits to stop further agressions.
I guess Ukraine can accept many conditions and deals and trades, but eventually it needs to be a country that is reasonably safe from furter invasion. Apart from territory and resources, that is the main reason why this war is fought and there is no point in closing it just to have Ruzzia re-armed and invade again in a few years.
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How naive. Have you considered that after direct US-Russia talks, US knows exactly what it's doing? And that the show was to start a change in public opinion. Next i'm expecting Z in a suit, bending his knee before Trump, signing 50% of his people's resources away while at the same time thanking Trump for military aid that Biden provided, and not expecting any more aid in the future. Without security guarantees, they get a ceasefire now, and an acknowledgement that eventually Ukraine will fully fall back in RU's sphere of influence.
The US does always know what they are doing. The problem seems to be that they are doing something that does not exactly play in the US people favour in the long term.
Zelensky will do whatever he needs to do, problem being that there will be another war in maybe a year.
Putin has 4 years to keep the landgrab under the Trump administration that is clearly showing weakness beyong measure.Your predictions may be correct, however you are ignoring that Europe has given at least half of the aid received by Ukraine. That is not only not going to stop, it is set to increase.
https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c9vygkzkkrvoPutin will happily take a cease fire, rebuild somewhat the economy, try to get the funds unfrozen, etc... but most of those funds are in Europe not the US and there is no impediment to use them as war reparations. This is hundreds of billions - the type of money you need to arm a country to the teeth.
https://www.reuters.com/markets/europe/german-arms-maker-shares-jump-hopes-higher-defence-spending-2025-03-03/And the rest of the world is not going to si quietly.
https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/russia-could-concede-300-bln-frozen-assets-part-ukraine-war-settlement-sources-2025-02-21/Exclusive: Russia could concede $300 billion in frozen assets as part of Ukraine war settlement, sources say
Now, let's see if your naivety lets you add two plus two here.