The pro-war party has won — for now

Following the Trump-Zelenskyy fallout, the war hawks have the wind in their sails once again

Zelenskyy’s visit to the White House on Friday was expected to be a mere formality, intended to finalise the much-discussed US-Ukraine mineral deal (with the final text already published) and serve as a first step toward a negotiated settlement of the war. Instead, it devolved into an unprecedented debacle — a heated confrontation between Zelenskyy, Trump and Vance played out before the world’s cameras.

The showdown came at the end of a tense but cordial thirty-minute conversation in front of the cameras. Lingering in the background was the issue of security guarantees, which had not been resolved before the press conference: Zelenskyy was demanding an explicit security backstop from Trump in return for the resources (and as a precondition for any future peace deal), presumably a commitment to intervene directly on Ukraine’s behalf in case of renewed military action by Russia — a request Trump has consistently rejected.

Tensions suddenly flared when vice-president JD Vance told Zelenskyy that the war had to be ended through diplomacy. What kind of diplomacy, Zelenskyy replied. Talking over the Ukrainian president, Vance told the visiting leader it was “disrespectful” for him to come to the Oval Office and make his case in front of the American media and demanded that he thank Trump for his leadership.

“You’ve done enough talking. You’re not winning this”, Trump told him at one point. “You gotta be thankful. You don’t have the cards”. “I’m not playing cards”, Zelenskyy replied. “I’m very serious, Mr President. I’m the president in a war”.

“You’re gambling with World War Three”, Trump responded. “And what you’re doing is very disrespectful to the country, this country, that’s backed you far more than a lot of people said they should have”. Vance retorted: “Have you said ‘thank you’ once this entire meeting? No”.

Finally, Trump concluded the spectacle in his signature, unapologetically Trumpian style: “All right, I think we’ve seen enough. What do you think? This is going to be great television. I will say that”. Minutes later, Trump wrote on Truth Social that Zelenskyy could “come back when he is ready for peace”.

Zelenskyy’s message, posted shortly after on X, was more conciliatory: “Thank you America, thank you for your support, thank you for this visit. Thank you @POTUS, Congress, and the American people. Ukraine needs just and lasting peace, and we are working exactly for that”.

But it’ll take more than PR to mend the rift between the two presidents — if it can be mended at all. The extraordinary media spectacle has already had massive global repercussions, raising numerous questions about its potential impact on the course of the conflict in Ukraine — and its eventual resolution.

Before analysing the wider implications, however, there is a question that needs to addressed first: given the extraordinary and virtually unprecedented nature of this public standoff in diplomatic history, one must ask: was it somewhat “premeditated” — and if so, by whom? — or was it a spontaneous breakdown, the result of mounting tensions and irreconcilable demands? The answer could have profound implications for how this episode influences future negotiations and the global perception of those involved.

Some have suggested that the public dress-down of Zelenskyy was a PR stunt carefully crafted by Trump, implying that the resource deal might have simply been a ploy to lure the Ukrainian president to Washington. According to this narrative, the public humiliation of Zelenskyy may have been a way for Trump to force hawkish Republicans still sitting on the fence to drop their support for the Ukrainian president (if so, it worked; see, for example, Lindsey Graham’s volte-face) or perhaps, more generally, to “demythify” Zelenskyy in the eyes of the American (and Western) public — a form of deprogramming after years of Western propaganda aimed at lionising him as a Churchill-like statesman fighting for freedom and democracy against Russian expansionism — in order to justify pushing him out of the negotiations or even forcing him to step down.

If that was the aim, and depending on the target audience, it was either a partial success or a complete failure. While the confrontation seems to have shifted public perception about the Ukrainian president in the US and even eroded support for him among the US mainstream media establishment — with CNN stating that Zelenskyy “must either magically heal this rift, somehow survive without America, or else step aside and let someone else try — the last perhaps the easiest” — it has had the opposite effect in Europe, further galvanising support for the Ukrainian president, and deepening transatlantic tensions, at least on the surface.

Alternatively, the move could be seen as a precondition for completely cutting off funding to Ukraine, or threatening to do so, thereby forcing Zelenskyy to negotiate on the basis of US-Russian terms. US support, after all, remains crucial for Ukraine’s combat capabilities. In addition to supplying weapons and ammunition, the US continues to provide essential support in areas like satellite communications, primarily through Elon Musk’s Starlink system, which plays a vital role in maintaining Ukraine’s connectivity on the battlefield.

Moreover, Ukraine remains heavily dependent on US funding — primarily through USAID — even just to maintain basic state functions such public sector salaries, social services, etc. If the US were to cut off its support, Ukraine’s state functions would effectively collapse — and there is simply no way for Europe to fill the gap, particularly when it comes to critical infrastructure like satellite connectivity. Indeed, prior to Zelenskyy’s visit, the State Department had already terminated a USAID initiative to help restore Ukraine’s energy grid.

One could endlessly speculate about Trump’s motives, but ultimately there’s a problem with the “staged event” narrative. Throughout most of the 50-minute conversation, Trump comes across as relatively cordial, while it is Zelenskyy who escalates the tension towards the end — seemingly irritated by Vance’s remarks regarding Ukraine’s reluctance to engage in diplomacy. It is, of course, possible that Trump and Vance’s plan was precisely that of triggering Zelenskyy by raising some sensitive issues in front of the cameras; after all, Zelenskyy had already been repeatedly mocked throughout the day (including by Trump himself) for not wearing a suit, so tensions were already running high.

The opposite could also be true, of course: that the standoff was “staged” by Zelenskyy himself — possibly as a way of strong-arming Trump into publicly committing to continue funding the war, offering stronger security guarantees, or, more realistically, casting Trump in a bad light in order to justify his resistance to a US-Russian peace settlement. By creating a public spectacle, Zelenskyy could have been attempting to send a clear message to both domestic and international audiences — reinforcing his stance on Ukraine’s need for sustained Western support while framing his resistance to a potential peace settlement as a matter of principle rather than political manoeuvring.

This may seem sound like a bit of a stretch, but one has to take into account how invested Zelenskyy is in the continuation of the war: if the conflict were to end, his political career would likely be over — and, in a more extreme sense, his very life could be at risk. One also has to consider the possibility that Zelenskyy may have been pressured to adopt an inflexible stance, or even to “humiliate” Trump, by sections within the European establishment who are equally invested in the continuation of the war. After all, the very next day, Zelenskyy wrote the following on X:

It will be difficult [to continue the war] without the US support. But we can’t lose our will, our freedom, or our people. We’ve seen how Russians came to our homes and killed many people. Nobody wants another wave of occupation. If we cannot be accepted to NATO, we need some clear structure of security guarantees from our allies in the US.

Europe is ready for contingencies and to help fund our large army. We also need the US role in defining security guarantees — what kind, what volume, and when. Once these guarantees are in place, we can talk with Russia, Europe, and the US about diplomacy. War alone is too long, and we don’t have enough weapons to push them out entirely.

In other words, doubling down on the failed “peace through strength” strategy that has landed Ukraine in this mess in the first place. This is the worst possible strategy for Ukraine — the longer the war continues, the worse Ukraine’s positions will become — but not necessarily for Zelenskyy himself.

Of course, it is also possible that neither part had “planned” this, and that it was, in fact, an unscripted public meltdown. In any case, we’ll probably never know the truth. What matters now is the political fallout — and its potential impact on the development of the conflict. Before moving on to that, however, it’s important to analyse the arguments put forward by both sides during the Oval Office dispute, as they offer valuable insights into how false narratives continue to shape the reality of the conflict.

Much of what Trump and Vance told Zelenskyy was factually and even morally correct: Ukraine is losing the war, it’s running out of soldiers and its best option lies in negotiating a deal sooner rather than later, as the continuation of the war can only worsen Ukraine’s negotiating position. It’s hard to disagree with any of this.

But, as on previous occasions, Trump’s Ukraine narrative failed to include many key parts of the story, as it presented the war solely as a consequence of the Biden administration (“If I had been president, the war would never have started”), rather than the result of a decades-long US imperial project spanning several administrations — like most imperial projects — and lasting at least twenty years. This includes Trump’s first administration.

Key episodes include: the US-influenced “colour revolution” in 2004 (Bush Jr 1-2), NATO’s announcement at the Bucharest summit that it intended to admit Ukraine as a member (Bush 2), the US-instigated coup in 2014 (Obama 2), the ramping up of Ukraine’s military and its de facto integration into NATO structures (Trump 1), and the final escalation leading to Russia’s invasion in 2022 (Biden). In short, this war cannot be attributed to any single US administration, although it is clear that the Biden administration bears a particularly heavy responsibility. The true cause lies within the broader framework of the US imperial state, a system that transcends individual administrations and remains largely consistent in its pursuit of geopolitical dominance.

This imperial structure, shaped by long-standing military, economic and strategic interests, has perpetuated policies that escalate conflicts, often regardless of the party in power. Therefore, while each administration may add its own nuances and specific actions, the overarching responsibility lies with the mechanisms of US imperialism that continue to drive international conflict. Indeed, even Trump’s decision to wind down this conflict could be viewed as the natural culmination of this imperial project, which now appears ready to be set aside, as many — though not all — of its objectives have been accomplished. These include Europe’s economic weakening, its geopolitical decoupling from Russia, and the continent's complete energy dependence on the US.

But, of course, Trump cannot admit this, as it would be too damning for the overall image of the United States. After all, it wouldn’t be the first time the US embroils itself in a military conflict and then attempts to pivot away without taking responsibility: Vietnam, Iraq, Afghanistan — the list is endless. This explains the somewhat paradoxical situation of Trump and Vance telling Zelenskyy that the war has destroyed his country while simultaneously demanding “gratitude” for the financial and military support provided by the US — support that, in many ways, enabled the war to unfold in the first place.

Moreover, acknowledging the deep roots of the Ukraine war would force Trump to admit that during his first term he also played a key role in escalating the conflict: in 2017, his administration was the first to supply Ukraine — already three years into a bloody war against pro-Russian separatists in the east — with lethal weaponry, approving the sale of Javelins, man-portable anti-tank missiles. Prior to this, the Obama administration had been reluctant to supply Ukraine with lethal aid, opting instead for non-lethal assistance. Interestingly, Trump even boasted about this during the Oval Office exchange: “Obama gave you sheets and we gave you Javelins”, he reminded Zelenskyy.

This marked a significant escalation of the US’s direct involvement in the Ukrainian civil war, further heightening tensions between the US and Russia. The US-supplied Javelins were used effectively to inflict serious casualties on ethnic Russians in the east, exacerbating the conflict. Between 2016 and 2020, the US provided substantial financial and military assistance to Ukraine, totalling approximately $1.95 billion, as part of efforts to strengthen its defence capabilities.

This assistance was aimed at bolstering Ukraine’s military capabilities and “improv[ing] interoperability with NATO forces” — signalling that Washington would begin treating Ukraine as a de facto NATO member regardless of its formal status. Meanwhile, the United States and other Western countries, acting outside of NATO, armed, trained and coordinated with the Ukrainian military, and reaffirmed the commitment that Kyiv would join the Western Alliance. As Warwick Powell, adjunct professor at Queensland University, writes:

With US support, the Armed Forces of Ukraine (AFU) became Europe’s largest land army, trained to NATO standards and supplied with a growing amount of NATO/US equipment. Between 2015 and the end of 2021, the AFU underwent significant expansion and modernisation, becoming Europe’s largest land army outside of Russia. […] By the end of 2021, Ukraine had Europe’s largest non-Russian standing land force, fully prepared for large-scale conflict. The Trump Administration played its role in this process.

Moreover, in 2019, the Trump administration also unilaterally withdrew from the 1987 Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty. Fearing that this boosted the risk of a US first strike, Moscow sought new, mutual restrictions and moratoria on missile deployments; Washington dismissed the Russian proposals. The United States also began to conduct military exercises near Russia’s borders. For example, in May 2020, NATO conducted a live-fire training exercise inside Estonia, 70 miles from Russia.

Zelenskyy was elected in 2019 with the promise of bringing peace to Donbas by implementing the Minsk agreements, a series of French- and German-brokered deals aimed at bringing the conflict in eastern Ukraine to an end, including constitutional reforms in Ukraine granting a measure of self-government to certain areas of Donbas. There is evidence that Zelenskyy took his mandate seriously. However, from the start, far-right nationalists expressed their violent opposition to the implementation of Minsk, even going as far as threatening to kill Zelenskyy and his family.

There was one powerful actor that could have reined in the extremists: the US government. Yet no substantial American support was ever given to the peace agenda. As the late scholar Stephen F. Cohen prophetically warned in October 2019, Zelenskyy would not be able to “go forward with full peace negotiations unless America has his back” against “a quasi-fascist movement” that was literally threatening his life.

It’s also worth noting that during this period Trump didn’t lift the sanctions imposed on Russia by Obama nor did he move to bring Russia back into the G8.

In short, Trump himself played a pivotal role in bringing us to where we are today. The irony is that Zelenskyy is fully aware of this, just as he knows perfectly well that successive US administrations led Ukraine down the primrose path, pressuring its leaders to adopt an increasingly confrontational stance toward Russia, ultimately leading to war. Yet, Zelenskyy cannot acknowledge this historical reality either, as it would undermine the entire narrative of the “unprovoked invasion”.

This is why his own remarks in the Oval Office were also filled with omissions — and outright lies. These were masterfully debunked by Aaron Maté in a recent article:

To make his case that Putin cannot be negotiated with, Zelensky invoked an agreement, brokered by France and Germany, that he signed with Putin in Paris on December 9, 2019. The pact called for a prisoner exchange, which, Zelensky asserted, Putin ignored. “He [Putin] didn’t exchange prisoners. We signed the exchange of prisoners, but he didn’t do it”, Zelensky said.

Zelensky was not being truthful. He himself attended a December 29, 2019 ceremony welcoming the return of Ukrainian prisoners freed under his agreement with Putin. Then in April 2020, his office hailed the release of a third round of prisoners.

That was not his only false statement. In insisting that Putin can’t be trusted, Zelensky omitted his own record in undermining diplomacy with Moscow. […]

The Russian invasion forced Zelensky to abandon his hostility to negotiations, resulting in the Istanbul talks of March-April 2022. While Zelensky now claims that Russia cannot be negotiated with, his own representatives in Istanbul hold a much different view.

“We managed to find a very real compromise”, Oleksandr Chalyi, a senior member of the Ukrainian negotiating team, recalled in December 2023. “We were very close in the middle of April, in the end of April, to finalize our war with some peaceful settlement”. Putin, he added, “tried to do everything possible to conclude [an] agreement with Ukraine”.

According to former Zelensky advisor Oleksiy Arestovich, who also took part in the talks, “the Istanbul peace initiatives were very good”. While Ukraine “made concessions”, he said, “the amount of their [Russia’s] concessions was greater. This will never happen again”. The Ukraine war, Arestovich concluded, “could have ended with the Istanbul agreements, and several hundreds of thousands of people would still be alive”.

The US and UK sabotaged the Istanbul talks by refusing to provide Ukraine with security guarantees and encouraging Zelensky to keep fighting instead. Zelensky’s decision to obey their dictates helps explain why he is so desperate to obtain a security guarantee from Trump.

This illustrates that both sides are, in a sense, trapped within their own false narratives about the war. As a result, both sides are unable to engage in an honest, nuanced conversation about the root causes and potential solutions. This self-imposed blindness only deepens the crisis. Indeed, acknowledging the truth about the conflict is not only a matter of historical accuracy but also a crucial issue for the “peace process”. From Russia’s perspective, a long-term settlement requires reforming the international system to prevent future great power proxy wars and conflicts like this one. Achieving that, however, arguably necessitates a profound rethinking of the US’s role in the world and a critical reappraisal of its actions up until now.

This brings us to the most pressing question: how can we expect the Trump-Zelenskyy face off to impact the course of the war and the ongoing peace negotiations? So far, it’s not looking good. The clash in Washington has had the effect of further emboldening the aggressive pro-war stance of European leaders, most of whom rushed to social media to express a copy-pasted declaration of unwavering support for Ukraine and commitment to “a just and lasting peace” — dog-whistling for continuing the war. Then, on Sunday, they convened in London to come up with their alternative “ceasefire plan”, which includes four key points:

• Europe will keep the military aid flowing to Ukraine and increase economic pressure on Russia.

• Any future settlement must include Ukraine at the negotiation table, whereby Ukrainian sovereignty and security are paramount.

• Ukraine’s defence capacity will be boosted (by the Europeans) so as to deter future Russian aggression and invasion.

• The UK and others will commit troops on the ground and planes in the air to secure the peace, provided that there is strong US backing for this.

This will have tragic consequences for Ukraine: it will prolong the war of attrition, likely resulting in further territorial losses for Ukraine and ensuring even more senseless bloodshed. The idea of implementing a ceasefire followed by a European “security guarantee” in the form of European (i.e., NATO) troops on the ground would not only represent an incredibly dangerous escalation, if implemented — raising the risk of direct confrontation between Russian and NATO forces — but, more importantly, it would be categorically rejected by Russia.

Russia has consistently stated that it does not see a ceasefire as viable without a broader framework for negotiations, and it has made clear that it will not accept the deployment of NATO troops in Ukraine under any circumstances. The very reason Russia initiated this war in the first place was to prevent Ukraine from becoming a NATO garrison state, whether de jure or de facto.

So Russia will reject Europe’s faux “peace proposal”, which in turn will be used by the Europeans as evidence that the Russians aren’t willing to negotiate. In other words, this is a recipe for the continuation of the war, at least in the short term — which is the intended outcome of both European leaders and the current Ukrainian regime. In other words, the European have succeeded in derailing Trump’s peace negotiations, in the short term at least, just as I had predicted.

I’ve extensively analysed the political and even psychological reasons for such reckless behaviour on the part of European leaders elsewhere, so I won’t repeat those points here. However, I would add another element to the discussion: that the Europeans may not be acting alone, but may be coordinating with factions of the US national security state and Democratic establishment who also have a vested interested in derailing peace talks and using the Europeans to disrupt Trump.

Whatever the case may be, it must be emphasised that Trump bears his own responsibility. It is of course perfectly possible that the Europeans would have attempted to hijack the “peace talks” even without Friday’s public breakdown of Ukraine-US relations, but there is no question that the latter made their job much easier. That is why, in the immediate aftermath of the Oval Office clash, I didn’t join the chorus of critics of the US-NATO proxy war celebrating Zelenskyy’s humiliation, and claiming this was a “win” for Russia.

On the contrary, I said that what happened wouldn’t help the goal of achieving peace in Ukraine: not only would it embolden hawks in Europe, but it also exposed the unpredictability and outright recklessness of Trumpian diplomacy. None of these things are conducive to peace. Interestingly, I came across an interview with the Russian political scientist and analyst Sergey Markov in a Swedish magazine in which he essentially makes the same point:

Psychologically, it certainly feels good that the West is being divided. But if you think sensibly, this situation is more risky for Russia. We want a peace agreement, now we see that Ukraine is prepared to continue fighting. For the Kremlin, a “peace agreement” means peace on Russian terms. Ukraine must compromise on all points. It seemed to be working — Trump successfully pressured Ukraine. But in the White House, Zelenskyy suddenly put his foot down and this is not at all beneficial for the Kremlin.

Whether this event was a staged move by Trump that backfired, whether he was outmanoeuvred by Zelenskyy or whether it was simply a spur-of-the-moment occurrence, the fact remains that Trump has lost control over the negotiation process — at least for now. But the real question is whether he ever really had a coherent plan to end the conflict in the first place.

After all, in the days leading up to his meeting with Zelenskyy, Trump and other administration officials were sending very mixed messages about the future of the conflict: Trump spoke of the proposed US-Ukraine resource deal as one that would give Ukraine “lots of equipment, military equipment and the right to fight on”, while his Secretary of Defence Pete Hegseth said that Europe should continue providing military aid to Ukraine in the future. Meanwhile Trump repeatedly voiced his support for the idea of European “peacekeepers” in Ukraine — despite Russia’s vocal opposition.

So one has to question how well the US-Russia negotiations were going to begin with, especially considering that, from Russia’s perspective, peace involves much more than simply accepting Russia’s control over the annexed territories (which Trump appeared willing to concede), nor is it even just about halting NATO expansion. As Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov stated recently, for Russia, a long-term settlement to the conflict in Ukraine requires a profound reform of the international system to prevent the recurrence of great power proxy wars and conflicts like this one, both in Ukraine and beyond.

This means redefining the global balance of power — and, importantly, devising a new European security architecture — with the West finally acknowledging Russia’s security interests and, more generally, the multipolar nature of today’s world. There is no indication that Russia and the US were anywhere close to reaching an agreement on this geopolitical grand bargain — which would, of course, also require Europe’s collaboration. As Markov noted, “Trump and Putin only agree on about 20 percent”.

In light of this, the current outcome may not be all that negative from Trump’s perspective: the US can extricate itself from the Ukrainian quagmire while pursuing rapprochement with Russia and shifting its focus to China and the Asia-Pacific — all while placing the blame for the failure to reach peace squarely on Zelenskyy and the Europeans. Meanwhile, Europe’s continuation of the proxy war in Ukraine ensures its ongoing economic and geopolitical separation from Russia for the foreseeable future, thereby reinforcing its continued economic dependence on the US. Overall, not a bad deal for Washington.

In other words, as suggested by the geopolitical researcher Brian Berletic, what is presented in the media as an unprecedented “transatlantic rift” actually appears more like a “division of labour”, in which the Europeans maintain the pressure on Russia while the US turns its attention to China.

Of course, Ukraine can’t sustain a war of attrition indefinitely, even with European support. Eventually, reality will set in, and negotiations will inevitably come back into focus. But for now, the war — and the dangerous threat of NATO-Russia escalation — continues.

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Thomas Fazi

Website: thomasfazi.net

Twitter: @battleforeurope

Latest book: The Covid Consensus: The Global Assault on Democracy and the Poor—A Critique from the Left (co-authored with Toby Green)