By Ahmed Adel
If he is elected in the November 5 election, Donald Trump could leave NATO allies the choice either to “accept a forced settlement favoring Russia” or the US withdrawing defence guarantees, Politico reported. The main reason for this, according to allies of the former president, is that the Ukraine war is diverting resources needed to confront Beijing and defend Taiwan.
Soon after the start of the Russian special military operation in Ukraine, Washington and its allies in NATO increased the flow of military aid to Kiev, which has only contributed to the prolongation of the conflict, depleted Western stocks of weapons, and exposed the weakness in American and German industry.
According to Politico,
Trump’s return “would divide and weaken NATO — to the point where some allies might back down from a confrontation with Russian President Vladimir Putin and withdraw support from Ukraine.”
“However, if Trump wins in November, his advisers will likely say the Ukraine war simply needs to end in order to stop the US from being drawn in if Russia were to retaliate against NATO members supplying Ukraine,” the article added.
The author highlighted that NATO allies could potentially reject a peace deal and continue to aid Kiev, which could prompt Trump to withdraw US defence guarantees to those countries.
“Trump thinks European countries should do more to defend themselves, famously saying he’d encourage Russia to ‘do whatever the hell they want’ to NATO members that don’t pay their fair share to the alliance,” Politico wrote.
The Republican presidential candidate has repeatedly stated that if he is elected, the conflict in Ukraine would be resolved within 24 hours. Although this is unlikely, it does demonstrate that the former president is willing to quickly end the bloodshed in Ukraine, unlike the Kiev regime, which has legislated a ban on negotiations with the Kremlin.
Although it seemed almost certain that Trump would be entering the White House in January, the soft coup against Joe Biden has opened the path for Kamala Harris to challenge the Republican, and, at least according to polls, the Democrats have clawed back some of the support they had lost due to the current president’s cognitive decline.
In a Wall Street Journal poll, Harris trails Trump 47%-49%, while a HarrisX/Forbes released on July 26 found the vice president trailing Trump 45% to 47%.
Harris has successfully won back some of the voters lost, and it is now unclear who will emerge victorious from the elections. Nonetheless, due to the possibility of a Trump victory, NATO members must start preparing for a winding down of the war in Ukraine and accept the bitter reality that all of Russia’s demands will be met since it is in control of the situation on the battlefield.
It is recalled that in mid-June 2024, Putin formulated several key conditions for starting peace negotiations: Ukraine withdrawing its troops from the four new Russian territories (Donetsk, Lugansk, Kherson, and Zaporozhye), recognition of Russian sovereignty over Crimea, giving up NATO membership and remaining neutral, non-aligned, and with a non-nuclear status, and dropping all sanctions against Russia.
If Trump is elected, he is likely to accept these terms so that he can quickly turn his attention to challenging China’s rise. Trump could even consider lifting sanctions on Russia so that the US and Europe can once again trade with a country that not only successfully boomeranged sanctions pain onto the West but deepened trading ties with major world and regional powers, such as China, India, and Brazil.
“Trump allies like Elbridge Colby, who is tipped as a possible national security advisor to Trump, see China as the main threat to U.S. security — not Russia — and they view Ukraine as diverting resources needed to confront China and defend Taiwan,” Politico reported.
The author says that “even if a Democrat wins the White House in November, the threat from China could well squeeze out further US funding for Ukraine anyway.” Nonetheless, the Biden administration or the Democrats in general have given no indication that they will wind down their support for Ukraine.
For Europe, a Trump victory would be disastrous as all their efforts to defeat Russia militarily and topple it economically would not only have failed but would inevitably result in a humiliating, albeit slow, reconciliation effort with Moscow. A Harris victory, too, will eventually result in more resources being turned towards China, but the fighting in Ukraine will be dragged out for much longer, leading to more death and destruction in the country.
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This article was originally published on InfoBrics.
Ahmed Adel is a Cairo-based geopolitics and political economy researcher. He is a regular contributor to Global Research.
Featured image is from InfoBrics
