When President Volodymyr Zelenskyy of Ukraine met with US President Donald Trump and Vice President J D Vance in the Oval Office on February 28, a curious feature was that this meeting was held under the full glare of the press, replete with cameras. The conversation between Trump, Vance and Zelenskyy started out amicably enough with Trump welcoming him to the White House. However, when a reporter from the press pool asked Vance a question, matters quickly unravelled.
Vance proceeded to disparage the Biden administration’s policies toward Ukraine and then suggested that Trump was offering a diplomatic pathway to end the war. When Zelenskyy intervened, questioning Trump’s diplomatic efforts, as is now well known, matters quickly became heated, soon degenerating into a three-way exchange of harsh words. A lunch that had been planned for the Ukrainian presidential delegation was left untouched as Zelenskyy left the White House upset and, no doubt, shocked and dismayed.
In its wake, the vast majority of Republican politicians have supported the Trump administration and seemed nonchalant about the obvious diplomatic contretemps. Most, in fact, chose to criticise Zelenskyy. A rare exception was Senator James Lankford of Oklahoma who sharply criticised Russian President Vladimir Putin on a national television show on Sunday. Nevertheless, he found occasion to support Trump’s efforts to start a dialogue with Moscow to end the war.
If anyone following this administration’s approach to the brutal war in Ukraine had any lingering doubts about its stance, the Trump-Vance meeting with Zelenskyy should have effectively ended them. For Trump, forging a working relationship with Putin is far more important than standing by an ally in dire need of American diplomatic and military support.
The reasons for Trump’s willingness to reach a rapprochement with Putin do not need one to resort to any squalid conspiracy theories. Instead, at least three key factors can be easily adduced. First, Trump has a clear penchant for authoritarian leaders ranging from Putin in Russia to Viktor Orban in Hungary. He had, during his first term in office, expressed an admiration for Xi Jinping even as he had been at odds with the People’s Republic of China on a host of issues. Second, though unstated, it is not difficult to infer that he sees Putin as a fellow Christian, White nationalist compatriot. Third, at a very different level, that of geopolitics, Trump and some of his key foreign policy advisers believe that reaching an understanding with Russia might enable Washington to help undermine the growing closeness between Moscow and Beijing.
If pursuing these goals requires breaking with European allies and abandoning Ukraine, it is evident that the current administration has few, if any qualms, in pursuing this strategy. If the likes of President Emmanuel Macron of France and Prime Minister Keir Starmer of the United Kingdom had entertained hopes that they could charm and flatter Trump to restrain, if not dispense with, his worst instincts, the recent meeting with Zelenskyy has put paid to such pipe dreams.
In the wake of this very public diplomatic meltdown, what ramifications ensue both for Europe and Ukraine? It is already more than evident that with predictable exceptions, the major European countries are now rallying around Zelenskyy. Giorgia Meloni, the right-wing prime minister of Italy, to no particular surprise, has urged Zelenskyy to go back and try to repair relations with Trump. However, from Starmer to Macron, and beyond, there has been a clear expression of solidarity with Ukraine. Olaf Scholz, the outgoing German Chancellor, at a conference on the security of Ukraine in London, reiterated his country’s support for Ukraine’s sovereignty and made clear that the war could not end on Russia’s terms.
After the end of World War II, despite occasional vicissitudes stemming mostly from policy differences, the transatlantic alliance had endured. It had even weathered some serious crises; most notably, when France and the United Kingdom had embarked upon the ill-conceived and ill-fated invasion of the Suez in 1956. In its wake, Sir Anthony Eden, the British prime minister, felt compelled to resign using the subterfuge of ill health. However, after the crisis had ended, the transatlantic relationship, including the “special relationship” with the United Kingdom, moved on. More recently, several European countries, most significantly, Germany, had been at odds with the George W Bush administration’s decision to invade Iraq. Yet again, after a period of frostiness, the ties between Europe and the United States were not only restored but strengthened.
In the wake of Trump’s unwillingness to protect Ukraine, his feckless readiness to erect a swath of trade barriers in the form of tariffs on European goods while constantly chiding European allies for not sharing what he deems to be their fair share of the defence burden, most of Europe is now concluding that America, at least under Trump, simply cannot be seen as a trustworthy and reliable ally and partner. The strategic transformation that is under way is nothing short of the political equivalent of a tectonic shift. Starmer, when unveiling a four-step plan for Ukraine at a conference in London, did not exaggerate the gravity of the situation when he said,“We are at a crossroads in history.” Whether most of democratic Europe can take the fork in the road that, despite the costs that it will have to bear, guarantees the security of Ukraine and the continent, remains the key question that will be addressed in the next few weeks and months.
The writer is a senior fellow and the director of the Huntington Programme on Strengthening US-India Relations at the Hoover Institution, Stanford University
Vice President JD Vance, right, speaks with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, left, as President Donald Trump listens in the Oval Office at the White House. (Source: AP Photo) 
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