Ukraine and the coalition of the unwilling
Europe’s Trump-whisperers might get the US to tighten Russia sanctions and increase aid to Kyiv, but they still need a plan B
Gideon Rachman
© Ann KiernanIf Vladimir Putin wants peace, he has a funny way of showing it.
Over the weekend, Russia launched its largest aerial attack on Ukraine since the full-scale invasion of February 2022.
A day later, Donald Trump was asked if he was ready to intensify sanctions on Russia and responded laconically — “Yeah I am.”
The US president’s comment may have sounded like an off-the-cuff response to the latest Russian attacks.
In fact, it reflected the outcome of a call between Trump and 10 European leaders on Thursday that took close to two hours.
The European leaders included Emmanuel Macron of France, Ursula von der Leyen of the European Commission, Volodymyr Zelenskyy of Ukraine, Giorgia Meloni of Italy and Alexander Stubb of Finland.
During the call, Trump was sometimes profane and confrontational.
But the Europeans have got used to that.
They believe they are close to getting the Trump administration to intensify secondary sanctions on buyers of Russian energy and stepping up military aid to Ukraine.
The White House argues, with some reason, that the Europeans should get their own house in order first.
In Thursday’s call, Trump called out the EU for still importing energy from Russia.
The European response was that EU purchases are now down to 20 per cent of prewar levels — and a lot of that is accounted for by Hungary and Slovakia, the two member countries that are closest to Trump’s Maga movement.
A compromise outcome is that Europe will move forward with efforts to end all energy purchases from Russia while calling on the White House to put pressure on its friends in Budapest and Bratislava. Scott Bessent, the US Treasury secretary, confirmed to NBC’s Meet the Press that the goal was to increase pressure on the Russian economy and for “the US and the EU [to] do this together”.
In the call, Trump also criticised European leaders for not doing anything to put pressure on China, the biggest buyer of Russian energy which has just agreed to open a major new gas pipeline with Russia.
The European response was to agree to work with the US on secondary sanctions aimed at China — with a focus on goods that help the Russian war effort.
The European Commission will move rapidly to technical discussions of how this might be done.
On Friday, von der Leyen had what Bessent called a “very productive call” with Trump and vice-president JD Vance.
Since the Russian economy is highly dependent on income from energy exports, toughened sanctions could put real pressure on Putin.
There are already signs that the country’s economy is under increasing strain.
But the military pressure on Ukraine is also rising.
And the US and Europe know that they need to do something to alleviate that.
The “coalition of the willing” that met in Paris last week discussed possible postwar military assistance for Ukraine — including the deployment of a “reassurance force” of European troops in the country.
However, many of the most important countries in that “coalition of the willing” are in fact unwilling to deploy troops to Ukraine.
The reluctant include Germany, Italy and Poland.
Even those who say they would contribute to a “reassurance force” deployed in Ukraine want the US to provide a backstop of logistical and air support.
They also only seem prepared to deploy troops to Ukraine in the context of an agreed ceasefire with Russia.
Russia, however, insists that it will never agree to the deployment of European troops on Ukrainian soil — and would indeed regard them as a target.
So, saying that European troops will be deployed in Ukraine only after a ceasefire is agreed could give Russia a perverse incentive never to agree to a ceasefire.
Fortunately, European leaders understand these pitfalls and are working on faster and more practical ways of increasing military assistance to Ukraine.
Since it is understood that Russia is unlikely to agree to a negotiated ceasefire, there is now talk of creating a “de facto ceasefire” through an American “air shield” for Ukraine.
The air shield would involve a big increase in air defences that could close the skies to Russian drones, although not to ballistic missiles.
The Europeans would contribute, partly through naval support that could help to protect Ukrainian airspace.
There is discussion of the deployment of aircraft carriers, probably from Europe.
The Europeans know that it would be a mistake to rely on Trump’s word alone.
So they are hoping to see the tougher measures against Russia approved by Congress.
Senator Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, a Republican Russia hawk, is key to those efforts.
The clear danger for the Europeans is that they are so immersed in the intricacies of diplomacy — and the fine art of Trump-whispering — that they are missing the big picture.
The US president has repeatedly signalled by word and deed that he does not want to commit to the defence of Ukraine.
The newly renamed Department of War is reportedly soon to announce that America will concentrate on defending its own interests in the western hemisphere.
Getting Trump to increase military and economic pressure on Putin — and to stick with it — would be an incredible feat of persuasion.
It is certainly worth a try.
But Europe needs a plan B, for when the Trump-whispering fails.
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