Trump struggling to push Putin because they 'have really built a friendship', researcher says

FRANCE 24 English

We speak to Natasha Lindstaedt, Deputy Dean and Professor in the Department of Government at the University of Essex, about the war in Ukraine and the negotiations for a ceasefire. She says that Trump and Putin 'have really built a friendship and that's made it difficult for Trump' to push hard for a ceasefire.  Visit our website: http://www.france24.com  Like us on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/FRANCE24.English  Follow us on Twitter: https://twitter.com/France24_en

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00:00This is apropos. Well, according to the US president, Kyiv and Moscow are to immediately

00:08begin ceasefire negotiations, following what Donald Trump is describing as an excellent call

00:13with his Russian counterpart. Vladimir Putin, meanwhile, indicated that there had been no

00:18major breakthrough. Trump has also been speaking with the Ukrainian president and other European

00:23leaders in the hope of making progress towards ending the war. Putin, meanwhile, indicated

00:29that there hadn't been much of a breakthrough there. With the details, here's Yinka Oytari.

00:35It's the latest diplomatic effort towards ending the war in Ukraine. A two-hour phone call between

00:42Vladimir Putin and Donald Trump, which the Russian president says was informative and frank.

00:51The US president expressed his position regarding the cessation of hostilities, a ceasefire, and I,

00:58for my part, also noted that Russia also supports a peaceful settlement of the Ukrainian crisis.

01:07We simply must determine the most effective path towards peace.

01:13Putin says he's now ready to work on a memorandum for future peace talks, but major gaps remain between

01:19Russia, Ukraine and the US regarding how to end the war. President Trump nevertheless hailed Monday's

01:25discussions as excellent. The US leader says negotiations towards a ceasefire will start

01:31immediately, an announcement yet to be confirmed by the Kremlin.

01:35Last week's failed discussions in Istanbul between Kyiv and Moscow seem to now be a distant memory for

01:40Trump and Putin. The Russian president refused to attend those talks, which were the first direct

01:46negotiations to take place between the two sides since the start of the war. Putin has also been playing

01:51hardball with the EU and the US, rejecting their calls for a 30-day truce. Washington's patience has

01:58been running thin, but the administration has so far done little to ramp up the pressure on Russia.

02:04Trump's frustration was put on full display during February's disastrous Oval Office meeting

02:09with President Zelensky.

02:14For more, we're joined now by Natasha Linstead, Deputy Dean and Professor in the Department of Government

02:18at the UK-based University of Essex. Natasha, thanks so much for being with us. So, Donald Trump describing

02:25this phone call with Vladimir Putin as excellent. Vladimir Putin perhaps a bit more of a low-key response

02:32there. He's saying kind of no breakthrough really has been made during that two-hour conversation.

02:37For you, how significant are the calls that we've seen today? Donald Trump also speaking

02:41with the Ukrainian president and several other European leaders.

02:46I guess I would say that they're significant in that there needs to be some kind of communication

02:50taking place. But with every meeting, there is absolutely no breakthrough. Nothing has happened.

02:57And that's because Vladimir Putin doesn't want to make any kind of concession. And thus far,

03:02he hasn't made any concessions. He failed to show up at the meeting in Istanbul, which was a meeting

03:08that he had suggested himself. So, I think that really illustrates how seriously he is taking these

03:16peace talks. He's essentially kicking the can down the road or saying things to the effect of that we

03:20have to address the root causes of the conflict, which for him, in terms of what also his

03:27elites in Russia think, the root causes of the conflict is that Ukraine is independent and is

03:33a sovereign nation. And because Russia wants to control pretty much all of Ukraine, or at least

03:40have a pliant president in charge of Ukraine, it makes it almost impossible to get to any point of

03:47agreement. And all of the proposals that Russia has been putting forth, which the Trump administration

03:53has been essentially echoing these types of talking points, Ukraine unequivocally will not agree to,

04:00because they don't want to unconditionally surrender. What they want to start with first

04:05would be some kind of ceasefire, but we don't see any movement towards that.

04:08No, we're seeing a difference in approach coming from the White House, not quite from week to week,

04:14but Donald Trump hasn't really been consistent with any of this. Do you see any evidence that there's

04:20been any kind of a shift at all in the Russian position? No, no, there hasn't been any shift at

04:27all. The only things that have happened is that the U.S. has at times moved a little bit towards

04:34Ukraine, but then kind of swung back. So one of the big concessions that the U.S. made was announcing

04:40that essentially Crimea would be part of Russia. That was a huge turn,

04:47U-turn from decades of U.S. foreign policy, always supporting the sovereignty of Ukraine.

04:53So while there's been a little bit of movement from the U.S. side, maybe moving a little bit more

04:58sympathetic towards Ukraine at times, but mostly repeating what the Russians want and understanding

05:05what the Russians want, there hasn't been any movement at all from Putin. He wants to appear

05:11as though he's interested in peace. He's hoping for some kind of sanctions relief and to improve

05:17the Russian relationship with U.S. But he wants to improve this relationship by offering absolutely

05:22nothing. Yeah. And meanwhile, Donald Trump, we've seen him repeatedly threaten new sanctions on Russia.

05:27Is there any indication that he's actually ready to go down this path? And if he does,

05:31what difference would that actually make?

05:33So he's threatened sanctions at least three occasions when he said, if Putin doesn't do this,

05:42then we're going to have to levy harsher sanctions. And every time Putin has ignored him and Trump has

05:50done pretty much nothing. Now, it is true that even if the U.S. tried to apply harsher sanctions on

05:57Russia, it wouldn't really make that much of a difference because the U.S. and Russia don't do that

06:00much trade with one another at the moment. It's just a few billion. And we've seen that the Russian

06:06economy has been able to weather these types of storms. I think what would be more effective,

06:12of course, would be arming Ukraine better. And that's where we've seen the most improvement in

06:20terms of the state of the conflict. And regardless of all this, Ukrainians have done much better on

06:27the battlefield in many ways. If you look at the number of casualties, the number of seriously

06:31injured and killed, it's been twice as many Russians as Ukrainians. So what they would need,

06:36really, is more military support, more financial support. I don't think it would make a huge

06:41difference, stronger sanctions being in place. Well, where does all of this leave Zelensky then?

06:47You know, he's seeing these phone calls taking place, eyes of the world on Donald Trump again,

06:51and Vladimir Putin. What actually is going to come of all of this also for Europe? Where does Europe

06:58stand with all of this? Again, it's being excluded from these talks between Washington and Moscow.

07:05So this is really concerning for Zelensky. There's very little room for him to maneuver. He's had to

07:12play nice with Trump. He's had to get on Trump's good side, get the mineral deal in place because they

07:18really needed that vital military intelligence. That was actually more catastrophic for the Ukrainians

07:24than the loss of the military support, military aid. So Zelensky is trying to improve his relationship

07:32with Trump. I think he's done a good job with that. But other than that, there's not that much that he

07:37can do other than underscore to US and European partners how important Ukraine's defense is to European

07:45and global security. Now, from the European standpoint, there have been all kinds of high

07:50level meetings taking place, and they're going to need to increase the aid to Ukraine to see it as

07:57a priority and to try to stay more involved in the talks, even as Trump and Putin try to sideline Europe.

08:04Yeah, you know, it can be a rather perilous exercise trying to predict what Donald Trump might do next.

08:10But what do you think he is going to do here? Is he going to keep pushing to get some kind of

08:14breakthrough when it comes to ending this war? Or is it possible that he's just going to decide to

08:19walk away? So several times, his Secretary of State Marco Rubio has said that he's losing his

08:27patience. But in these instances, he was really saying he's losing his patience with Ukrainians.

08:33He seems to want to maintain a really good relationship and friendship with Putin. And that's

08:39one of the things that one of the Russian spokespersons had said, that they had a great phone

08:46call and neither of them wanted to hang up the phone. They have really built a friendship. And for

08:52Trump, that's made it difficult for him to really push hard on Putin to get some kind of ceasefire in

08:59place. I think the most likely option is that Trump will get bored, he'll get distracted by something

09:05else. And he'll leave things be and Putin will continue to ignore any kind of agreement. In fact,

09:13Zelensky had claimed that Putin had reneged on over 25 different agreements. So I think there'll be the

09:20hopes of an agreement, which Putin will go against. And we don't really know what Trump is going to do

09:26because he gets bored easily and may focus on some other different concern.

09:30Well, is Vladimir Putin then coming under any real pressure here at all?

09:37Not really, other than the pressure that he's facing from the Ukrainians. As I mentioned, that

09:42Russia's running out of troops. I mean, they have to recruit troops from North Korea,

09:46has been reported earlier this year, troops from Yemen and elsewhere, mercenaries. They're struggling to

09:54recruit their own troops. And the troops have performed really badly on the battlefield, in

10:01spite of the fact that they have a much bigger military, much more military spending. Whereas

10:05Ukraine has just done a fantastic job of defending the territory that they have. Putin's biggest coup is

10:12he's been able to get the US to stop some of the military aid that was going to Ukraine. Because,

10:20I mean, he is running out of time. He is really running out of troops. So, I mean, I see this conflict

10:29going on in a protracted way for a long time, because Putin seems willing to sacrifice a lot of his own

10:37men for this push against Ukraine, because he firmly believes that Ukraine is a part of Russia.

10:44Natasha, given what is at stake here, why has all of this been so stop, start, so disorganized? You've

10:52described it yourself as a farce, the situation that we had last week, you know, Vladimir Putin

10:57suggesting these talks in Turkey, then leaving it until the very last moment to indicate that he wasn't

11:03going to be there himself. I mean, that's an excellent question, but I think Putin has just been stringing

11:10everyone along, but particularly Trump, and using their friendship as a way to keep Trump interested,

11:18and that there is this possibility of peace, even though Putin has let Trump down numerous times.

11:25I mean, there was the notable episode where Trump posted on social media, Vladimir stop,

11:31Trump, which was a rare rebuke, or at least plea of Putin, because he doesn't have any control over

11:39Putin, and neither does really anyone in the international community. And as Putin is sort

11:44of free to do what he wants to do without facing any kind of repercussions, he didn't face repercussions,

11:48really, when Russia invaded Georgia in 2008, or invaded Crimea in 2014. He's been emboldened,

11:55in spite of all the huge losses that they've suffered on the battlefield, and he just feels like he's free

11:59to do whatever he wants to do. Natasha, we'll have to leave it there for now. Thanks for being

12:04with us this evening. That is Natasha Linstead, Deputy Dean and Professor in the Department of Government

12:09at the University of Essex.

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