Europe, Ukraine and Russia: Trump better get it right!

On the third anniversary of the Ukraine-Russia war―a horrific war that could have and should have been prevented by concerted US and European policy―it is crucial that US and international diplomacy to achieve a ceasefire lead toward a sustainable peace that can then serve as a stepping stone toward a new and more constructive US-European-Ukrainian-Russian relationship.

If correctly managed, a new relationship between the US, Europe, and Russia can, in turn, work in a concerted fashion with rising powers such as China and India, among other states, in seeking to mitigate, if not eventually “resolve,” other major conflicts between China and Taiwan, North and South Korea, Iran and Israel, for example, through diplomatic compromises.

Trump has initiated a major shift in post-Cold War US strategy. Contrary to Trump’s hardline first-term strategy, which was largely extended by the Biden administration, Trump’s “Peace through Strength” and “maximal pressure” stratagems no longer seek to pressure and “contain” both Russia and China upon the threat of war. Instead, in his second term, Trump seeks a US-Russia rapprochement that will draw Moscow away from an increasingly powerful China in addition to reducing Moscow’s defense and political economic backing for Iran and North Korea.

Will Trump’s policy of “Peace through Strength” enhance the overall prospects for regional and global peace? Will the result be Peace through Strength or World War Trump?¹

America First and Russia, China, and Iran

In a two-faced strategy, Trump has threatened sanctions, if not threats to use military force, against US rivals Russia, China, Iran, North Korea, and Hamas, to pressure these to agree to US demands—while concurrently offering the prospects of peace negotiations with presumed eventual benefits, which may or may not prove to be actualized.

The Trump administration has thus threatened maximalist “peace through strength” positions concerning both US allies and US rivals alike to achieve something close to Trump’s nationalist and personal business goals through tough bargaining. Yet his “America First” stance has concurrently raised questions as to the sincerity of American defense commitments and NATO Article V security guarantees.

For Moscow, Trump has warned that if there was not a ceasefire deal soon, he would “have no other choice ²” but to impose tariffs, taxes, and sanctions on “anything being sold by Russia to the United States and various other participating countries… We can do it the easy way or the hard way—and the easy way is always better… It is time to ‘make a deal.’ No more lives should be lost!”

Concerning China, in addition to adding 10% to already high tariffs on Chinese products, the Trump administration has removed the phrase "we do not support Taiwan independence" from its fact sheet on Taiwan relations. This implies that the US might support Taiwan in case of a Chinese effort to absorb the island by force or, more likely, blockade.

On the one hand, it was unclear if this change in wording represented a major shift in US policy toward China. On the other hand, Trump still claims to be a friend of China’s President Xi Jinping and that he can make a “deal.” (My proposal for an internationalized “confederal”³ solution to the China-Taiwan dispute.)

While signing an executive order to place a maximum pressure strategy on Iran, Trump claimed he wanted peace. Trump asserted, “I would like a deal done with Iran on non-nuclear. I would prefer that to bomb the hell out of it.” He also stated that Israel would not carry out a strike if there were such an agreement.

But what if there is no Iran nuclear deal⁴—for whatever reason? Would the US and Israel risk an attack on Iran?

America First and US allies

Trump has also pressured US allies, Germany and Denmark, among others, as well as Canada, Mexico, Panama, Japan, South Korea, and Taiwan, with high tariffs, for example. Trump has likewise threatened military action against Mexican drug cartels, but without necessarily promising to respect Mexican sovereignty.

At the same time, Trump wants to eliminate alleged Chinese political-economic influence from the operations of the Panama Canal by assisting Blackrock Asset Management to purchase the Hong Kong owned ports of Balboa and Cristobal on both sides of the Canal―so that US-controlled interests control sea lines of communication from the Pacific to the newly christened “Gulf of America,” Trump’s new name replacing the original, Gulf of Mexico. Trump hopes to weaken Chinese political economic influence in Venezuela, Mexico, and the rest of Latin America―in case of conflict or crisis.

By contrast, Israel appears to be an “exception” relative to other US allies. While other US allies are being threatened with cuts in US defense supports and with high tariffs, Tel Aviv has been given a carte blanche to violently expand its mini-imperium and to engage Palestinian “disposal” and democide regardless of the dangerous consequences to regional stability.

Trump and NATO and the European Union

Despite Trump administration reassurances⁵ to the contrary, several European states, particularly those in closest proximity to Moscow, fear the possibility that a US-Russia condominium or joint global management will place the geostrategic and political-economic interests of the US and Russia first and their interests second, if not last. These fears appear valid after Trump demanded that NATO allies spend up to 5% of GDP on defense―with the threat that the US would not defend them if they did not significantly augment defenses.

By reaching out to Moscow, one of Trump’s goals is to draw Russia away from closer ties with China, if not away from Iran and North Korea as well. Yet this approach raises questions as to how China, Iran, and North Korea might react, in addition to the impact on US allies. How might countries change their respective geostrategies if the US and Russia move closer together and if the US and Russia cannot or do not implement new mutual accords with their respective allies? Could Europe and Ukraine, for example, forge closer strategic and economic ties with China?

America First and the Arctic

As the Arctic region has become a new potential conflict zone between the US, Russia, and China, largely due to its deposits of critical raw materials, oil and gas reserves, and rare earth resources, Trump has not only threatened military action against Denmark concerning either selling Greenland or pressing Greenland to become independent, but he has also pressed Canada to become the 51st state.

While it is dubious Trump will use force, Trump’s demands appear intended to pressure Denmark/Greenland and Canada into providing some form of US geostrategic/defense positioning, as well as political economic access to energy resources and critical raw materials and rare earth metals, despite the ecological risks and dangers of extraction. Trump wants to defend the US from potential “ballistic, hypersonic, advanced cruise missiles, and other next-generation aerial attacks”—given the fact that the Arctic region represents the shortest route for such an attack from potential American rivals.

In pursuing a boondoggle for the military-industrial complex, Trump may want to deploy radar and “Iron Dome” missile systems and other defense systems in the Arctic regions. Trump likewise hopes to sustain US control over Arctic and North Atlantic sea lines of communication, given the fact that the Arctic route’s sea lines of communication significantly reduce shipping time. Ironically, the Arctic has become a potential conflict zone as a result of global warming.

America First and Ukraine

In dealing with Ukraine, Trump has demanded up to 50% of Ukrainian rare earth deposits, in addition to critical raw materials, in return for US military, political, economic, and financial support—even if the majority of rare earths are in the Russian-occupied regions of Ukraine. For its part, Kyiv claims it does not want to sell out its resource-rich land to multinational corporate investors. Washington wants to make a “deal” with Russia so Ukraine does not lose any more land and so both sides will not sacrifice any more soldiers and civilians.

Trump needs to show his domestic supporters that he is ostensibly obtaining a financial return on US spending of taxpayer money for supporting Ukraine in its war with Russia. This is true even if such money―in which up to 90% is spent ⁶ on the US military-industrial complex and US corporations and US non-profits―will dubiously return to taxpayer pockets. The point is that the money spent on the defense of Ukraine and its eventual reconstruction could be spent on other domestic American projects. Moreover, Kyiv is seen by Trump as provoking the war by not working out a deal with Russia, Germany and France in the Minsk 2 negotiations over the Donbass region.

In the bargaining process to obtain security guarantees, Kyiv has threatened to develop nuclear weapons―if it does not obtain ‘real’ US or NATO security guarantees in return. Yet contrary to his intent, Zelensky’s threat to develop and deploy nuclear weaponry, whether it is feasible or not, angers both Trump and Putin—and brings both to collaborate as did Clinton and Yeltsin in the period 1991-94 in pressing Ukraine to give up nuclear weapons leftover from the Soviet Union in the first stage of their very uncivilized divorce.

Trump’s maximum pressure bargaining to gain economic concessions in exchange for possible US security guarantees appears to be at the roots of the “insecurity-security dialectic” for Ukraine as the latter continues to battle it out with Russia. As a deal over rare earths and critical raw materials appears to be in the making, Kyiv has demanded that Ukraine, the Europeans, Turkey, as well as the UK and US, take a seat at the table of negotiations with Russia. Yet the question remains whether any such security guarantees will be from the US, NATO, the Europeans, or the UN, if any…. Or whether Kyiv might take the nuclear option if it fears isolation.

America First and the EU

Trump's policy appears aimed at weakening Germany and the E.U. This is to be achieved through high tariffs and demands for increased defense spending, up to 5% of GDP for NATO members, for example. These demands have been combined with US government support for populist and far-right causes, given Vice President Vance’s meeting with the co-leader of the right-wing German AfD, Alice Weidel, followed by President Trump's praise for the AfD after the February 2025 elections, ideological support from the Heritage Foundation’s Project 2025, and support for the AfD by influential individuals, such as Elon Musk.

While the Trump administration and conservative/right-wing European parties have emphasized the social and economic costs of uncontrolled immigration in their political campaigns, the real Trump geostrategic game is to eliminate government bureaucracy and regulations that restrain major corporations with respect to taxation, labor, and ecological regulations in both the US and Europe—at the risk of undermining the essentially supranational and social democratic nature of European Union governance. A weakened EU—if it cannot forge a harder UK-Franco-German core—would then permit the US, Russia, and China to more freely assert their political, economic, and strategic interests in Europe.

America First and national defense

US steps toward a unilateral peace through strong “national missile defense” under Trump’s Iron Dome plan appear to contradict Trump’s calls for nuclear arms and missile reductions with both Russia and China and could risk a new nuclear and hypersonic arms race⁷.

The Trump administration plans to take $50 billion away from “woke Biden-era non-lethal programs and instead spend that money on President Trump’s America First, peace through strength priorities.” Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth asserted that he wanted to make “our military once again the most lethal, badass force on the planet to keep our country safe.”

While some Pentagon programs would be cut, and some government waste ostensibly eliminated, funds for border protection, fighting transnational criminal organizations, nuclear modernization, submarine programs, missile defense, drone technology, cybersecurity, core readiness and training, and the defense industrial infrastructure would be sustained. Given these goals, it is not clear if the overall US defense budget will be significantly cut or just redirected for new so-called “peace through strength” purposes.

To counter Russian medium-range nuclear capabilities deployed during the Ukraine war, the Biden administration, Germany, and NATO had planned to deploy conventionally armed ground-launched intermediate-range missiles in Germany on a rotational basis beginning in 2026. These weapons could include the Tomahawk cruise, Standard Missile-6 (SM-6), and hypersonic missiles that have a significantly longer range than missiles now used to strike Russia from Ukraine.

Likewise, to counter Chinese and North Korean nuclear capabilities, the Biden administration had also planned to deploy similar missiles at US military bases in Guam and the Philippines to counter China’s missile capabilities. Biden had also agreed to deploy nuclear-armed submarines in South Korea.

The Pentagon sees Russia and China as cooperating against Taiwan, while Moscow and Beijing see Taiwan as trying to stir up a “Ukraine-style” crisis in Asia to attract outside support. If Trump decides to follow through with Biden’s intermediate-range missile deployments, the return of such weaponry to Europe and now to the Indo-Pacific would threaten a new Euromissile crisis of the period 1978 to 1987 as well as a brand new “Asia-missile” crisis—upon the threat of major power war.

Prospects for peace between Ukraine and Russia

Assuming a ceasefire can be implemented, a formal establishment of Ukrainian non-nuclear neutrality, accompanied by deployments ⁸ of international peacekeeping forces, acceptable to both sides (perhaps from India, South Africa, Brazil, Serbia, Ireland, Malta, Switzerland and possibly from Turkey, Hungary, and Slovakia, even if the latter three are NATO members, under a general UN or OSCE mandate) can serve as incentives for Russia to end the war, coupled with the initiation of European and global arms reduction/elimination accords. For its part, Kyiv could obtain strong security guarantees from the Europeans, if they can boost their defense capabilities, and possibly from the Americans, if Trump accepts―but only in backing the deployment of neutral international peacekeepers deployed in key regions of contention from behind the scenes, outside of Ukraine—that is until, and if, both Moscow and Kyiv can negotiate a full settlement.

A peace settlement should eventually allow for future territorial compromises and could eventually involve shared or international sovereignty over contested areas. In this proposal, the US and EU could work with other countries, including Russia, China, India, and others, under a UN- or OSCE-backed international consortium to develop Ukraine’s mineral and energy wealth in both Ukrainian and Russian-occupied areas. A portion of the funds raised could help support war reparations, peacekeeping, and reconstruction.

Simultaneously, with international forces and some European forces deployed in Ukraine, Washington and Moscow should seek to reshape European and global security cooperation and begin to establish confidence and security-building measures throughout all of Eastern Europe, if not in other conflict zones, including reductions/elimination of conventional arms in forging a new CFE treaty. The more the US, NATO and Russia ameliorate their relations, the less the Europeans will need to boost defenses for Ukraine.

Multilateral negotiations should also take place with respect to disputes between Russia and Baltic states and over the Russian Kaliningrad/Suwalki gap, between Transnistria and Moldova, between Georgia and South Ossetia and Abkhazia, as well as Serbia and Kosovo, for example. Working with Beijing is essential due to its political and economic influence on Moscow, and due to the fact that Beijing’s Belt and Road project and Polar Silk Road impacts Kaliningrad and the Baltic region.

While Europe can and should begin to better coordinate its defense spending, Washington and Moscow should begin serious discussions as to how future strategic arms deals could include all forms of U.S. and Russian weaponry. They should also discuss a “transparency mechanism”⁹ to meet Russian concerns with the deployment of U.S.-NATO missile defenses and other NATO military infrastructure. One of the major goals should be reductions of ICBMs, as well as the elimination of intermediate and short-range nuclear weapons, as the latter are war-fighting weapons.

If a sustainable peace can be established with respect to Ukraine―accompanied by a new concerted NATO-European-Russian interrelationship that also involves US-European-Russian-Chinese arms reductions/eliminations―the task of reaching sustainable peace accords in other regional conflicts will prove much less difficult. New nuclear and conventional arms reduction/elimination agreements would also reduce the expenses of a new, more unified European defense capability that would link the UK, France, and Germany.

Dangers ahead

The danger is that Trump’s erratic unilateralist “America First” tactics not only tend to exacerbate ongoing conflicts but also foster new ones. A number of European states, particularly those on the NATO front line with Moscow, have feared that Trump’s effort to prevent a direct NATO-Russia military confrontation will undermine the credibility of the US commitment to NATO’s Article V to Russia’s advantage. Critics also question whether Trump’s rapprochement with Moscow will be able to draw Russia fully away from China, Iran, and North Korea.

If Trump fails to establish a sustainable peace between Ukraine and Russia that can result in a new US-European-Russian reconciliation, the chances of yet another global war will augment. Much as was the case before both World War I and World War II, homines geopolitici et economici are definitely entering a moment that the Biden administration repetitively referred to as an “inflection point” in history—a moment that could either turn the world toward global peace or toward a devastating major power conflict.

This article is based on my talk at the Colloque International pour la Paix, Academie de Geopolitique de Paris, February 24, 2025.