Omair Ahmad 
Donald Trump’s first week in office after being re-elected as President of the United was full of sound and fury, with executive orders dashed off on everything from immigration to international aid. The most consequential thing, though, was what did not happen – clarity on how Trump’s administration will deal with the war in Ukraine.
Trump had stated that he would solve the conflict in 24 hours and this has not happened. Instead, the war is in full swing, with massive drone attacks and a slowly advancing Russian Army.
The Kremlin dismissed reports of an early phone call between Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin as “pure fiction”, but such a call seems inevitable. The challenge is whether Trump will have anything to say to that will change Putin’s behaviour. Economic threats, such as those of more sanctions, are unlikely to be effective, given how many sanctions on Russia are already in place by the US. Trump could raise the military ante.
He has done this before when he ordered the assassination of Qasem Soleimani, perhaps Iran’s most effective general, in 2020. He has, reportedly, also done this against Russia in Syria, okaying the elimination of Wagner mercenary forces.
Ukraine is neither Iraq, Iran, or Syria
That said, Ukraine is neither Iraq, Iran, or Syria. A low-level unpublicised strike in Ukraine, like the one against Wagner forces in Syria, would likely lead Russia to escalate against a multiplicity of NATO targets, all sitting ducks. A high-level publicised assassination, as with Soleimani, might even risk nuclear war.
There is absolutely no indication that Trump would do this for Ukraine, which is governed by a President he personally dislikes. Added to this a large section of Republican voters believe the US has no responsibility for Ukraine’s security, is doing too much to support Ukraine, and feel that Russia’s invasion poses no threat to US interests.
Of course, Trump could threaten to raise or even just maintain the extraordinary level of military aid that the US has extended to Ukraine. Since 2022 to the end of October 2024, the US has allocated $88.33 billion in aid to Ukraine, by far the most of any country. Germany comes second, having allocated $15.69 billion.
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This, though, might take years to show any result, would go against Trump’s own stated preferences, and the preferences of most Republicans. The fact that he has focussed on domestic culture war issues, primarily immigration and gender issues, in most of his executive orders and not even mentioned Ukraine in his inauguration seems to suggest this is far from his thinking.
In fact, without a concerted policy by his administration to push for more aid, there is little chance that the generous financial backing that the Biden administration extended to the Ukrainian military is likely to continue. Putting it simply, there is little that Trump can say to Putin that is likely to dissuade the Russian leader from believing that all he needs to do is push onward towards victory.
Unless there is a dramatic and unanticipated change, the US has given up on the Ukraine war, and Putin knows it.
Not the first time Trump walked away from a war
This would not be the first time Trump walked away from a war. Despite much bluster and threats, he eventually concluded a deal with the Taliban to leave Afghanistan – although it was the Biden administration that put it in place.
Similarly, he withdrew most US troops from Syria and left the Kurdish allies of the US to the gentle attention of Turkey and its allied forces. But Afghanistan and Syria were not important battlefields for the US, Ukraine, on the border of the European Union, is. Abandoning a war there will have both domestic and international consequences.
The extraordinary bullying that Trump is subjecting his allies and neighbours – whether Panama, Mexico, Canada or the NATO countries – is premised on the threat of force. If Putin successfully calls Trump’s bluff in Ukraine, this threat evaporates. Not only will this have consequences for the rest of Trump’s policy abroad, it will undermine him totally at home, a loser who buckled against a bully, and a substantially weaker bully than the US. The problem is that he has painted himself into a corner.
Either he has to deliver something remarkably fact with tools that he has thrown away, or watch his power evaporate over the next few months as the world sees him for the hollow braggart that he is. Both choices are bad ones, and whatever he chooses will define his legacy forever after.
Omair Ahmad is an author. His last novel, Jimmy the Terrorist, was shortlisted for the Man Asian Literary Prize, and won the Crossword Award.