After a three-year “freeze” of political and diplomatic ties between Moscow and Washington, with the arrival of a new American leader in the White House, President Trump initiated noticeable progress in the search for new approaches to building normal relations with Russia. Speaking recently at a hearing in the U.S. House of Representatives, Secretary of State Marco Rubio called the situation, set up under the administration of former President Biden, irresponsible, when “the two largest nuclear powers on the planet” did not communicate with each other. According to him, this does not mean that Washington and Moscow should become allies or friends if conditions do not change, however, he noted that the countries should at least maintain a certain level of contacts to be able to communicate and negotiate in order to prevent miscalculations and conflicts.
After Trump’s inauguration on January 20, a diplomatic “metamorphosis” occured in US policy on the Ukrainian track, unexpected for Washington’s allies: from the main supporter of the armed conflict between Ukraine and Russia, the main financial sponsor and supplier of arms and ammunition, satellite intelligence to the Kiev regime, the United States suddenly turned into a classic peacemaker and began to actively advocate for ending the conflict and achieving a speedy peace on Ukrainian soil, while not stopping the supply of weapons under the agreement concluded by the previous administration with Ukraine.
When formulating his new approach to Kiev, Trump did not agree with Ukraine’s future membership in the North Atlantic Alliance and declared his readiness to recognize Crimea as a Russian entity.
In the international expert community, such a reversal in American foreign policy was unequivocally regarded not as spontaneous, but as a thoughtful and prudent line by President Trump, primarily as a businessman who came to the conclusion that despite all the efforts of the United States to contain Russia and the colossal multibillion-dollar military and financial assistance to Kiev, the situation on the battlefield over the past three years it clearly demonstrated the impossibility of achieving a military victory over Russia and the high probability of the defeat of the Kiev regime and its capitulation in the future . Based on national interests and seeking to avoid additional financial costs from participating in the Ukrainian conflict, which was obviously a loser for the United States, Trump began to act not as a politician, but as a prudent businessman, declaring that “this is not his war, but Biden’s war” and he intends to seek an end to hostilities between Russia and Ukraine, and Kiev, for its part On the other hand, it must compensate with its mineral natural resources for most of the $350 billion in American military aid it has received.
As part of his peacekeeping initiative, Trump called the Russian President to clarify Moscow’s position on the possibility of stopping attacks on Ukrainian energy infrastructure for a period of 30 days, and also sent his assistant Witkoff to Moscow to probe the Russian side’s approaches to resolving the conflict in Ukraine and normalizing relations with Washington. As a result, Moscow agreed to a thirty-day moratorium on strikes on energy infrastructure proposed by Trump to both sides of the conflict in order to support the American leader’s beneficial initiatives and his desire to establish US-Russian relations. However, as further developments have shown, despite the strict observance by the Russian side of the moratorium on attacks on Ukraine’s energy sector and the subsequent ceasefire announced by Russia on the days of Orthodox Easter and the celebration of the 80th anniversary of Victory Day, Kiev, for its part, repeatedly violated the terms of the moratorium and voluntary ceasefire during the holidays. All this may indicate the incompetence of the Kiev regime, as well as the insufficient control of the Armed Forces units and especially the nationalist formations on the line of combat contact by the Kiev leadership.
At that time, Ukraine’s Western sponsors, primarily UK, France and Germany, launched a media campaign about the “unacceptability” of Moscow’s peace initiatives and demanded in an ultimatum form from Russia an immediate, unconditional truce with Ukraine and a cease-fire for thirty days, threatening to impose further “crushing sanctions.” The Russian leadership regarded this demarche as proof that the Ukrainian Armed Forces are experiencing serious problems and urgently need a pause to make up for losses, personnel rotation and supplies of Western weapons and ammunition.
In response, Putin made an unexpected and original diplomatic move – he offered to hold a Russian-Ukrainian direct meeting in Istanbul in three days without preconditions (without stopping hostilities) as part of expert delegations mediated by the Turkish Foreign Ministry. This came as a complete surprise to Bankovaya street in Kiev, as it sounded like an ultimatum and for the first time the word “war” with all its consequences was used instead of the abbreviation “SVO” [Special Military Operation]. It was only after Trump’s call that the Ukrainian delegation arrived at the meeting.
The meeting took place on May 16 this year, during which the parties announced their positions on the conflict and agreed to exchange memoranda on their vision of the modalities of possible ways of settlement and ceasefire by the next meeting. The parties agreed on the terms of the prisoner exchange according to the “1000 to 1000” formula, which was successfully implemented later with the mediation of Minsk. The head of the Russian delegation, Medinsky, generally confirmed the immutability of our position, which is based on the statement of the President of the Russian Federation dated June 2024 at a meeting at the Russian Foreign Ministry on the terms of settlement in accordance with the goals and objectives of its military and transparently hinted that Moscow would defend its position, including on the battlefield as long as it takes time, but also he will make adjustments to his position depending on the changes “on the ground.” In general, no one in the world expected any breakthrough or results in these negotiations. The parties only confirmed serious differences in their positions, but agreed to continue negotiations in the future.
Assessing the first round of talks held in Istanbul in May this year, Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said that Russia would not allow itself to be deceived by those who propose first to agree on a ceasefire in Ukraine, and only then proceed to the discussion of settlement issues. As the minister recalled, the West had already deceived Russia in 2014, staging a coup in Ukraine, after the settlement agreement between the Ukrainian authorities and the opposition. Then the Minsk agreements were violated, which Germany and France were secretly not going to fulfill. In 2022, the West forbade Kiev to sign an agreement initialed in Istanbul on the principles of settlement proposed by the Ukrainian delegation during negotiations with Russia. The Kremlin has a clear position on the issue of a ceasefire, supported by the successful advance of our troops in all operational areas at the front, including the complete liberation of the Sunzhensky district of the Kursk region from the Ukrainian Armed Forces. In this regard, it is useless to put pressure on Russia. It will always be guided primarily by the interests of national security and the savings of the Russian people.
At the same time, the UK, France and Germany are becoming the main opponents of the long-term (over thirty days) truce in Ukraine and supporters of the continuation of hostilities, and coordinate and direct the actions of the Ukrainian authorities. Apparently, this explains the unexpected decision of the Kiev authorities immediately after the negotiations in Istanbul to conduct an operation to launch mass strikes on Russian regions using Ukrainian drones and long-range missiles.
- (from May 20 to May 27, the Russian air defense forces shot down about 2,500 drones), which provoked, as planned by Kiev’s curators, Moscow to respond harshly by destroying numerous military infrastructure facilities in Ukraine. It can be assumed that this provocation was made to displease Trump with Putin’s “aggressive actions.” It is known that neoconservatives surrounding the American president, such as Secretary of State Rubio and Special Envoy for Ukraine General Kellogg, often selectively inform Trump about the strikes of the Russian Aerospace Forces on allegedly “civilian objects” in Ukraine and forget to report Kiev’s strikes on Russian cities and towns.
- In general, most American military and political analysts conclude that the parties have such different approaches to resolving the armed conflict and are unwilling to make territorial concessions while remaining in Kiev of the anti-Russian and national radical regimes, any agreements are deemed to be problematic and difficult to implement. In this regard, it will be possible to reach genuine agreements only by military means, when mainly the human and material resources of the Kiev regime are exhausted.
- As for President Trump, it seems that he merely needs a quick result and a propaganda effect, and when he realizes that the problem is too politically complex and takes a long time to resolve, his mediation efforts and rhetoric will fade into the background. In a conversation with European leaders, he bluntly stated that Russia and Ukraine must find a way out of the armed conflict on their own. Secretary of State Rubio also confirmed Trump’s intentions, saying at a hearing in the US House of Representatives that if there is no progress in resolving the Russian-Ukrainian conflict, Washington is highly likely to withdraw its mediation efforts, shifting its attention to more important issues from the point of view of national interests related, for example, to China and Iran. According to him, the United States can no longer deal with and control all the problems in the world. In this regard, the White House also cannot afford to keep many foreign aid programs within the current state budget.
- Meanwhile, the process of finding a settlement on the diplomatic track continues. It was announced in Moscow that the second round of direct Russian-Ukrainian talks is scheduled for Istanbul on June 2 , during which the delegations will exchange memoranda and move on to discussions.
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