Trump must not TACO his way out of helping Ukraine
To this point, Putin has calculated that time is his ally; he could wait out the West's patience with a grinding, expensive war of attrition. Trump is trying to change Putin's assumptions, forcing substantive negotiations on a deadline by brandishing an economic weapon — secondary sanctions — the United States has hesitated to use. Yet Moscow might see Trump's latest move as the opening bid in a negotiation or otherwise discount the likelihood that the United States will follow through. 'In another six months or so, the pendulum could swing back the other way,' Sergey Poletaev, an analyst at the Russian analytical platform Vatfor, told NPR.
For the sake of Ukraine specifically and American credibility generally, Trump cannot back down.
Trump is clearly frustrated with Putin. On Monday, he described having 'pleasant' and 'lovely' telephone conversations with the Russian president, only to find out soon after that Russian missiles and drones were pulverizing yet another Ukrainian city. Whether that frustration manifests in strong, sustained U.S. support for Ukraine, in weapons shipments and other measures, will determine how this conflict finally ends.
Trump was typically vague in describing which actual weapons systems would be shipped to Ukraine, other than confirming that Patriot batteries and missiles, key air defense systems, would be among the hardware. This is crucial, as Russia in recent weeks has stepped up its devastating aerial bombardment as part of its much-telegraphed summer offensive, even as ground operations seem mired in a bloody stalemate.
Ukraine also needs more offensive weapons to hit targets behind the front line. This is where the previous Biden administration moved too timidly, and too late, always fearing that more direct Ukrainian attacks on Russia might ignite a broader regional conflict against a nuclear power. (They didn't.) The Trump administration should continue to follow the Biden team's belated policy to let the Ukrainians use the Army Tactical Missile System, or ATACMS, to fire long-range ballistic missiles to strike targets deep inside Russia.
Meanwhile, sanctioning Russia's ongoing trading partners would be a powerful tool to help bring Putin to the negotiating table. This is the path being pursued by a bipartisan group in Congress, which is proposing even higher sanctions of up to 500 percent on goods from countries that continue to buy Russian oil, gas, uranium and other exports. These sanctions would particularly hit China and India, which buy the bulk of Russia's oil.
But what if Putin refuses to make peace and sticks with his maximalist demands for a dismembered Ukraine under Russia's thumb? Is Trump ready to ramp up the pressure? Will he sustain the arms shipments once the stockpiles run dry? Will he seize billions of dollars in frozen Russian assets? Will he try to crack down on the shadow tanker fleet that moves Russian oil? And will he follow through on his secondary sanctions threat, with its potentially vast implications for trade with countries such as China and India?
The war against Ukraine has already persisted for far too long, with horrific casualty tolls on both sides. It will only end when Putin realizes he has nothing more to gain, and much more to lose, the longer it goes on. The arms shipments to Ukraine might bring that realization closer. More pressure can bring that day closer still. Now that Trump has issued his ultimatum, he needs to make clear to Putin he means what he says.
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