Philippe Alcoy
In just one week, the U.S. president threatened Putin by announcing the possible delivery of Tomahawk long-range missiles to Ukraine if he continued the war. A few days later, he spoke with him at length by telephone, just before a tense meeting with Zelensky at the White House. After this meeting, Trump announced that he would ultimately not send the Tomahawks to Ukraine in order to avoid an escalation with Russia, and immediately announced a meeting with Putin in Budapest. Five days later, the U.S. government postponed the Budapest meeting indefinitely and imposed sanctions on the Russian oil giants Rosneft and Lukoil.
This constant back-and-forth, this “diplomatic yo-yo,” may seem incoherent, but it likely reveals quite a lot. On the one hand, it may reflect the divisions that exist between different wings of U.S. imperialism: some more in favor of ending hostilities “at all costs” to avoid an uncontrollable escalation between Russia and NATO (as well as for domestic political considerations), and others who believe that the continuation of the war, on the contrary, serves the interests of the United States because it weakens Russia.
The Objectives of Trump’s Strategy
In any case, the United States does not seem comfortable with the situation in Ukraine, which, in its own way, reflects the difficulties facing U.S. imperialism on the international stage. The continuation of the war presents significant risks both domestically for the Trump administration, which will face midterm elections in a year, and within its electoral base, where the war in Ukraine remains deeply unpopular. It is worth recalling that Trump himself declared he would “end the war in 24 hours.” But the United States is also unable to force either Russia or Ukraine to make significant concessions to stop the fighting.
Beyond these differences within the North American establishment, the United States’ international strategy appears to be undergoing a shift: withdrawing from certain regions without completely disengaging. This shift implies a form of (forced) burden-sharing with its allies. This is what we have seen since Trump’s return to the White House. Despite the zigzags, the U.S. administration seems determined to force Europeans to assume the lion’s share of responsibility for the war in Ukraine. Analyst Kamran Bokhari explains it this way:
“Washington is fundamentally revising its 80-year-old geostrategy, shifting from global primacy to a model of selective engagement and regional burden-sharing. As part of this transition, allies and partner countries would assume primary responsibility for security in their respective regions, with Washington playing a supporting role. In Europe, U.S. policy is based on the principle that Russia, while capable of causing disruption, is no longer the threat that the Soviet Union posed to the United States. […] Russia will need several years to rebuild its economic base, replenish its arsenal, and restore its forces to readiness, which will diminish its ability to threaten Europe in the short term.”
In this sense, Washington continues to supply weapons to Ukraine, but through European powers that purchase them and then transfer them to Kyiv. At the same time, Trump continues to provide logistical support and share vital intelligence with the Ukrainian military, even though he has already threatened Zelensky with ending this collaboration. Contrary to what many analysts and mainstream newspapers claim, Trump is carrying out a controlled withdrawal, but this is by no means an “abandonment” of Ukraine by U.S. imperialism.
It is within this context that Trump has been trying for months to obtain, in one form or another, a cessation of hostilities, even if it takes the form of a precarious truce like the “ceasefire” in Gaza. However, for the moment, Washington has been unable to find a way to convince Putin, Zelensky, or the Europeans of the merits of its plan. Indeed, even though it has effectively excluded Zelensky and the European imperialists from direct negotiations with Putin, without their agreement it is essentially impossible to obtain a cessation of hostilities. For Zelensky, ceding more territory to Russia is politically explosive domestically, and for both Kyiv and the EU, it is inconceivable to accept weak U.S. security guarantees after the war ends.
The Contradictions of the European Union
The situation is deadlocked on that front. But this deadlock is not without risk for Ukraine either. In this sense, according to Stratfor, “Ukraine’s reluctance to make concessions on territorial and security guarantees could irritate the White House and lead to increased pressure for an agreement, which could include threats to end all military cooperation or intelligence sharing with Kyiv.”
For the European powers as well, the situation is not without its contradictions, and the current state of affairs could lead to additional complications. They are dependent on Washington for their security, and even though there has been a surge in the continent’s rearmament since 2022, the gap remains so wide that they cannot be satisfied with a rapid U.S. disengagement from Europe. In this context, their objective regarding the war in Ukraine is not to “make democracy prevail over Russian authoritarianism,” but to ensure that Ukraine holds its ground and that its army does not collapse, so that the United States remains engaged in the conflict — even if this requires purchasing weapons from them.
Indeed, a defeat for Ukraine, after all the support provided by the Europeans, would be a catastrophe and could reinforce centrifugal tendencies within the continent (particularly in Central and Eastern Europe, but also among populist nationalist movements in Western Europe). After constructing a political and media narrative around the conflict for more than three years, a defeat in Ukraine would weaken all the hawkish governments. Furthermore, it would starkly highlight the limitations of the European project and the inability of the continent’s major powers to ensure the protection of their vassals or semi-colonies in Eastern Europe — a crisis that could shake the European Union and exacerbate divisions between the continent’s various blocs. In other words, ultimately, the United States holds the stability and unity of the EU in its hands, which represents a significant strategic weakness for European imperialism.
The consequences of a Ukrainian defeat would also be dangerous for the United States, which has co-led the war from the beginning. It is in this context that the new sanctions against the Russian oil sector and the various attempts to pressure Putin into negotiations are taking place. These sanctions primarily target the customers of Russian oil companies (notably China and India, Russia’s main clients). These are essentially secondary sanctions that are beginning to have an effect, as Chinese and Indian companies have announced that they are “suspending” their purchases of Russian oil. Companies that buy Russian oil would lose access to dollar-based financing systems. However, the effectiveness of these sanctions remains to be seen, as it will be difficult to compensate for a massive withdrawal of Russian oil from the global market.
For their part, the Europeans have attempted to exert pressure on the Russian economy by adopting a new package of sanctions and are considering using some of the Russian assets frozen in European banks to finance Ukrainian reconstruction and armaments. However, they have been unable to reach an agreement because Belgium, which holds most of these funds, is demanding more legal and financial guarantees. Indeed, using Russian money held by banks on the continent is an unprecedented decision from a legal standpoint and very dangerous for any state that might undertake it — in this case, Belgium — which could be sanctioned and forced to reimburse Russia.
A Reactionary War That Could Spread
On the Russian side, even though it appears determined for now to continue the war and improve its leverage in any eventual negotiations, its situation is far from straightforward. Economically, Russia’s new budget is marked by cuts that directly affect workers and the broader working class. However, at this stage, the sanctions do not seem capable of pressuring Putin into negotiations. Analyst Ekaterina Zolotova explains that “it is understandable that the Russians want something to show for their sacrifices, whether it be conquered territories or the development of a strong, independent economy. Accepting new sanctions and entering negotiations from a disadvantageous position is, in the Kremlin’s eyes, nothing less than a defeat. It would therefore be wrong to think that the new sanctions will lead to swift and decisive negotiations.”
Putin is maintaining his demands for negotiations: control of significant portions of Ukrainian territory, including the entire Donbas region, and the fulfillment of his security requirements, with Ukraine becoming a state with limited military capacity after the war and never joining NATO. While Trump seems willing to accept some of these demands, they are unacceptable (for now) to both Ukraine and the EU. Therefore, Putin is forced to impose his conditions on the battlefield. But even then, there is no guarantee that Ukraine and the Western powers will accept these conditions in the long term.
In other words, the more time passes, the more total a victory must be — from the Kremlin’s perspective — for its demands to be heard and respected, which is no small feat. The situation appears deadlocked in the short term, and all possibilities remain open, including the most tragic. Certainly, Russia does not seem in a position to venture into a conflict with European NATO members, but if Putin finds himself backed into a corner and if Russia’s security were to be threatened, the scenario of a direct confrontation between Russia and NATO cannot be ruled out — a catastrophe for workers, young people, and the entire working class of the continent.
Trump’s policy is anything but a “policy of peace.” He is pursuing the reactionary interests of North American imperialism and preparing for future wars by proposing “solutions” that merely postpone the structural contradictions of the international situation. The Europeans have adopted a completely belligerent and Russophobic stance, as this allows them to legitimize their rearmament and mask some of their contradictions in an increasingly tense international arena. Putin and Russia, despite their weaknesses, are in no way a point of support for the working class. On the contrary, the Kremlin is defending the interests of Russian capitalism at the expense of the exploited and oppressed classes in Russia and neighboring countries. The reactionary regime that Putin leads cannot serve as an alternative to Western imperialism. The intensification of bombings against civilian targets in Ukraine in recent weeks demonstrates this once again. If workers and youth fail to break this reactionary dichotomy, the reactionary war in Ukraine could escalate into something far more catastrophic.
