Trump Wants to Gift Putin Something Ukraine Cannot Afford to Lose

Sign up for the Slatest to get the most insightful analysis, criticism, and advice out there, delivered to your inbox daily.

When Mary Harris got Tim Mak on the phone, he was getting ready to have something of a slumber party.

Mak is a reporter in Ukraine and the founder of a news organization called the Counteroffensive. He and his newsroom colleagues were staying up late because the biggest news in Ukraine was about to happen thousands of miles away in Washington—a meeting between President Donald Trump and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky.

“I often think that Americans don’t pay as close attention to American politics as Ukrainians do. And for good reason, right? Because, like, the Ukrainians are really very anxious about what’s happening next,” Mak said.

This anxiety is understandable, to be clear. The previous White House meeting between Zelensky and Trump ended with our president and vice president taking turns berating the Ukrainian leader. This meeting came on the heels of a summit between Trump and Russia’s Vladimir Putin—during which Trump appeared ready to support slicing off regions of Ukraine to be absorbed by Russia, full stop.

Fast-forward to Monday. Zelensky boarded a plane to try to fix this situation, as much as he could. But this time he brought a few friends to crash the Oval Office party: the prime ministers of Italy and Britain, NATO’s secretary general, the president of France, and the chancellor of Germany.

“The goal is trying to just get Trump … back on the pathway towards understanding that Ukraine needs to maintain its sovereignty and maintain some level of security guarantees so that if the war ends, it will be the last time a war like this is fought on Ukrainian soil,” Mak said.
On a recent episode of What Next, Mary Harris spoke to Mak about Zelensky’s White House redo, how Putin keeps playing Trump, and how Trump’s proposed land giveaways could set Putin up perfectly to invade Ukraine again. This transcript has been edited and condensed for clarity.

Mary Harris: The main thing to come out of the Trump–Putin meeting appeared to be this change in position, where Trump seemed in favor not of a ceasefire but of a permanent peace agreement between Russia and Ukraine. Why is that important? Why is the difference important?

Tim Mak: I wouldn’t merely characterize it as a change in position. I would say that that’s the adoption of the Russian position. It seems to be pretty disingenuous to me: They say that the war will end when they’ve dealt with all the root causes of the war. And they have a laundry list of reasons that they believe they were “forced”—and you’ll sense the sarcasm in my voice—to invade Ukraine. These mostly imaginary root causes cannot be addressed. And so they’re trying to, as much as possible, drive a wedge between Ukraine and what should be Ukraine’s closest ally in the United States—and take advantage of the situation politically.

Is it a play for time? To drag this out so that Russia can take more land, inch by inch?

That is one of the potential outcomes. But all of the possible outcomes in this direction, whether it is some peace deal that’s incredibly favorable toward Russia, or a huge break between Europe, Zelensky, and Trump, or the capture of additional territory on the battlefield through a grind-it-out method—all of those options are good for Vladimir Putin. The reason why Ukraine and Europe and Trump (until recently) were trying to demand a ceasefire as a precondition to peace negotiations is that it would actually show that Putin is serious about negotiating. Putin can continue to be unserious about negotiating—maybe serious if he gets a ridiculous deal that he can’t turn down, but otherwise pursue any sort of action that he wants. And that’s why he wanted this: It preserves all of his options while demanding nothing of him in return.

Trump also seemed to now be in favor of Ukraine giving up land, land that Russia hasn’t even taken yet.

It would be a mistake to think of this just as giving up territory or random parts on a map. The particular area that Putin is asking for is this area in Donetsk, which contains a vital fortification line called the Fortress Belt, which has kept Ukraine safe over the past 11 years of war. Putin taking this territory is not just a ploy for gaining additional space on a map—it’s so that, should he want to attack again in, let’s say, a year or two or three, he would be able to do so on the other side of a vital entrenchment line that has been able to keep the Russians at bay until now. So it’s not just a matter of territory. It’s a matter of strategic positioning.

Trump has also always been opposed to NATO membership for Ukraine, a goal that is important to Ukraine. Instead, there’s this talk about security guarantees directly from the United States. So instead of having NATO as the people who would come to Ukraine’s defense, if Russia stepped over the line or tried to take additional land, you would just have the U.S. intervening. What do you make of this idea?

Regarding security guarantees, from the Ukrainian perspective, in 1994, when Ukraine gave up its nuclear weapons stockpile, the U.S. promised to do what it could to maintain Ukraine’s territorial integrity and sovereignty. From the Ukrainian perspective, the Americans have already made a promise—and they haven’t kept it, at least not to the extent that Ukrainians believe they ought to.

It also seems to me like this one-to-one promise of the U.S. defending Ukraine, it’s so reliant on the U.S. keeping its word. And with Trump changing his mind about Ukraine and Putin again and again, I don’t know what that promise is worth if I’m Ukrainian.

We’ve seen a lot of these sorts of deals in the past fall through. If it’s not enshrined in law or in a treaty, and it’s just a government-to-government agreement, then if the government changes, it could be swiftly rescinded. So if Trump makes an agreement today, his successor could decide not to enforce it, or Trump could decide not to enforce it. And so it’s really shaky grounds on which to base the future of your country’s existence, which is what Ukraine is dealing with right now.

Trump did say he was going to speak to Putin after his meetings Monday. He said, actually, that Putin was expecting his call. Do you think that means we’re any closer to an end to this war than we were a week ago, a month ago?

I’d love to see it. I think that an end to the war would be a great first step toward justice for all the people who have been traumatized, whose lives have been ruined as a result of the war, to say nothing of the people who have died in this war. But I need to stress that I’ve seen no actual steps, any concrete steps, taken toward peace yet. We’re talking about talking at this moment.

I mean, Russia has promised, in 1994, in the 2000s, in the 2010s, that it would not violate Ukraine’s territorial integrity and sovereignty. And it has violated all of those promises and invaded and killed tens of thousands of people, wounded many more, destroyed or disrupted the lives of millions of Ukrainians. And so there’s no reason why the Ukrainians would be willing to take the Russian government at its word. The only way it would sign a deal is if it had commitments, rock-solid commitments from other countries to back it up should Ukraine be invaded again.

Sign up for Slate’s evening newsletter.