But how can Trump do such a thing? How can he switch off military support for Ukraine – and then look those casualties in the face?
Yesterday the people of Ukraine woke to survey the wreckage after another night of bombardment from Russia.
Putin sent more than 200 drones and missiles slamming into targets across the country. Among the casualties were four injured children, to add to the 2,500 Ukrainian children that Putin has killed or injured since he invaded.
What had those children done to deserve being blown out of their beds? No Ukrainian deserved this horror, in the most morally one-sided war of modern times.
Tonight, Putin will continue his campaign to destroy an innocent country, despatching his explosives with the extra confidence that the Ukrainians no longer have access to crucial US intelligence.
The Ukrainians are finding it harder to tell when those Russian bombers are taking off and to protect their families from death and injury. Is this what Trump – actually a very compassionate man – really wants?
Conspiracy theorists are claiming that Trump is an agent of deep penetration, a secret Hero Of The Russian Federation who has finally been activated by Putin.
His critics are wailing that he is on a mission to betray Ukraine, destroy Nato and usher in a might-is-right nightmare, where the strong do what they can and the weak suffer what they must. Why else would he seem to bully Zelensky and to suggest that Vladimir Putin is an all-round stand-up guy? Why else would he say that Ukraine ‘started the war’?
Nobody liked what happened last Friday and I can assure you that it was not meant to go that way – not by either side. But one of the results is that the outline of the Trump plan for peace is actually becoming clear
I have even heard it suggested that Putin has some kompromat so juicy that even Trump would be embarrassed if it came out. Could it be true? Well, folks, I hate to disappoint you but I think Trump’s critics are largely talking nonsense.
The US under Donald Trump has not gone rogue. The US is still the best and most important ally of this country – and of Ukraine.
Donald Trump is a dealmaker and what he wants – very sensibly – is peace.
His plan is one that I believe will help deliver the interests of Ukraine and of the US.
He is right to be going hard at it now because three years of grinding slaughter is enough. Before we criticise Trump for trying for peace, we should be honest about the inadequacies of the previous western approach.
It looked as though we were willing to do just enough to stop Ukraine from losing to Putin but not enough to help them win. If Trump can end this war and keep Ukraine free, that will be a blessing for Ukraine and the world.
Nobody liked what happened in the White House last Friday and I can assure you that it was not meant to go that way – not by either side. But one of the results is that the outline of the Trump plan for peace is actually becoming clear.
Look at the Minerals Pact or Reconstruction Investment Fund between Ukraine and the US.
In the very first paragraph, the US makes clear that fault for the 2022 invasion lies with Russia. In the next paragraph, the US pledges long term investment in a Ukraine that is ‘free, sovereign and secure’. And the agreement goes on to speak of further investment that will promote the security of Ukraine.
This language is of huge importance. It chimes with Trump’s deepest political instincts – about national sovereignty. A sovereign nation can choose its own destiny and which organisations or alliances it wants to join. A sovereign Ukraine can invite whomsoever it chooses to help fortify Ukraine against further attack – and the Ukrainians are choosing America.
Yes, it gives the US a generous 50 per cent share of the profits from the fund, to be derived from the excavation of Ukrainian minerals and other resources. But I don’t believe the deal is rapacious.
It will take a very long time for the fund to show a profit, which logically can only happen in peacetime with a free Ukraine. Remember: we were still paying back the US for Second World War Lend-Lease debts up to 2006, when Tony Blair was in power. That doesn’t mean Lend-Lease was a bad deal for Britain.
Yesterday Putin sent more than 200 drones and missiles slamming into targets across Ukraine
Trump has made the most important point himself: the minerals deal gives the US an ever-growing stake in the security and prosperity of Ukraine, a real motive to preserve that security.
You may say that this falls short of an article 5 Nato guarantee. But let’s face it – before Trump, Washington was offering Ukraine no security guarantees at all.
Now we are all embarked on a strategy to help protect Ukraine from further attack – the steel-quilled porcupine strategy. And here Trump has galvanised the Europeans to take the lead. The population of the EU plus Britain is about 520 million. The population of the US is about 340 million. Both Europe and America have given about $65 billion of military assistance. Which means, by my maths, that the average US taxpayer is paying considerably more for the military support of Ukraine than the average European taxpayer. That is an anomaly that Trump was elected to sort out – and he is.
It is a good thing that we are all now working on plans for a stabilising force for Ukraine led by Britain and France and backed by a ‘coalition of the willing’.
And it is good that Europeans are now taking the lead in discussing a Sky Shield to help the Ukrainians neutralise Russian drones and missiles.
But why this frenzy of European defence activity now? Why did Starmer last week announce that he was going to increase defence spending to 2.5 per cent of GDP?
Because he knew that he was off to Washington to see Trump the following day and he knew that he could not arrive empty-handed in the Oval Office.
Trump is now driving Labour policy on defence spending – and that is positive. And where is the money coming from? We are talking tens of billions when public finances are very stretched.
Again, we are going to have to learn a bit from Trump when it comes to cutting government spending – now at 44 per cent of GDP.
We are spending £140 billion a year on benefits for people of working age. In fact, more than 10 per cent of the working population is on a benefit of some kind, often for unverifiable complaints of muscular-skeletal pain or mental health problems.
I don’t wish to be unkind, but the proportion is double what it was ten years ago. A lot of these people are frankly having a laugh.
He may not be everyone’s cup of tea, but we need someone with the cost-cutting skills of Elon Musk. In fact, we need a DOGE-style task force to look at UK public spending – because there is more than enough fat to fund defence – and tax cuts, too.
Remember, we were still paying back the US for Second World War Lend-Lease debts up to 2006, when Tony Blair was in power. Pictured with President George Bush in 2007
The last person to answer vaguely to Elon’s Job Description was Jacob Rees-Mogg, whose plan to cut Government excess was sadly axed by Labour. If we want to join the rest of Europe – and spend more on defence – that plan needs reviving.
These investments in British manufacturing can drive jobs, growth and levelling-up – because we have world-
beating companies across the UK; and it is obviously insane that some pension funds are forbidding investment in these very firms.
If you want peace and love, invest in UK defence industries. Donald Trump has not demolished Nato. On the contrary, he has totally revitalised the alliance.
He is achieving the objective of every American president – getting the Europeans to take their own defence more seriously.
And yet as Starmer and every other European leader has been at pains to point out, it would be folly for the Europeans to believe that they can do any of this without American help.
British Forces will not be there to fight. The responsibility for defending Ukraine will continue to be fulfilled by the Ukrainians.
We will be there to train, to backfill and to serve as a deterrent and we would only go after a peace deal had been signed. Even so, any European force will need US back-up, logistical and intelligence support.
Here again, Trump is making positive noises and even suggested in the meeting with Zelensky that the US could conceivably join the peacekeeping mission itself. That is of huge importance.
We are starting to see a two-pronged strategy for Ukrainian long-term security: an economic partnership with America and a European led force – backed up by America – to help guarantee the peace.
So, the best way forward now is to get the US-Ukraine deal signed and the military aid started urgently – and then put the plan to Putin.
The reason Trump’s approach seems so unfair at present is that no pressure – none whatever – has been exerted on the Russians. But soon the squeeze will be put on the aggressors – and they won’t like it one bit.
Presented with a plan like this, Putin will squeal blue murder. He will insist that Ukraine must be neutral and must cut its aspiration to Nato membership from its constitution.
Sorry, Trump will say: Ukraine is a free and sovereign country. Putin will insist that the Ukrainian army must be cut down to 85,000 and that there can be no western troops in Ukraine.
Sorry, Trump will say: that is not compatible with Ukraine’s continued existence as a free and sovereign country. Whatever the precise carve-up of territory – and Trump has already said that Putin will have to vacate territory – Putin will fail in his fundamental objective.
Under this outline deal, he cannot control the long-term destiny of Ukraine. Under this deal, Ukraine is not returning to the Russian empire but is free to pursue its independent identity in the club of western nations, whether the EU or Nato.
Why should Putin accept this deal? He will be in no position to refuse. He has lost 850,000 soldiers, killed or injured. He has barely captured 20 per cent of the country.
His economy is tottering, with inflation running at almost 10 per cent. He will accept this deal, because Trump will force him to do so – with tighter sanctions, of the kind we saw last night; with the promise of unlimited support for Ukraine; and with the threat of taking those $300 billion of frozen Russian assets.
And Trump will put that brutal squeeze on Putin because he knows that he – Trump – cannot afford to abandon Ukraine. He knows that if Ukraine goes down, it will be the beginning of a global loss of confidence in America – and when confidence goes, it goes fast.
If Ukraine goes down, it will be like the fall of Bear Stearns: the first domino in a systemic collapse. Trump cannot and will not allow his presidency to be defined by this disaster.
The Ukrainians will settle for a reasonable peace that gives them their long-term freedom and independence. That is anathema to Putin.
It is Putin who will be ultimately forced to concede – and Trump can make him do so.
