(CLO) US President Donald Trump's plan to exclude European allies from Ukraine negotiations is worrying but may be the only way to resolve the conflict.
A potential Trump administration plan to exclude European allies from talks to end the conflict in Ukraine has rattled European leaders, but one expert says it may be the only way to resolve the conflict.
Rebekah Koffler, a strategic military intelligence analyst, former senior official at the US Defense Intelligence Agency and author of the book Putin's Playbook, shared that the reason Mr. Trump was able to exclude European allies from the negotiations was because of the lack of consensus within NATO on whether Ukraine should join.
“Some countries are in favor and some are against, so it would be a waste of time to bring this issue into the negotiations,” Koffler said. She also stressed that European allies had no significant contribution to the negotiations. According to her, Europe is not the decision maker on this issue.
“The only ‘decision makers’ are (Russian President Vladimir) Putin and Mr. Trump. And in this case, it is Mr. Putin who holds all the cards, in terms of the realities on the battlefield and off the battlefield,” Koffler explained.
Russian President Vladimir Putin and US President Donald Trump. Photo: X
Koffler's comments came as French President Emmanuel Macron held an emergency meeting with European leaders on February 17 to discuss Mr Trump's plans to exclude most European countries from talks on ending the Russia-Ukraine conflict.
The move is a major concern on a continent that believes it has a vital interest in being involved in talks to determine the terms of any peace settlement.
Despite concerns from European leaders, Mr Trump has insisted that Ukraine would be involved in any negotiations to end the conflict. “He will be involved, yes,” Mr Trump said of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy in a speech over the weekend.
Asked about Europe's role in resolving the conflict, Trump's special envoy for Ukraine and Russia, Keith Kellogg, said European involvement "is not going to happen," saying that adding too many players could complicate the negotiations. "We don't want to get into a big group discussion," Kellogg said.
Ms. Koffler said that Mr. Trump also shares this view. According to her, Mr. Trump is a realist and understands that Ukraine has lost the war. "In fact, Ukraine lost the war before it started," Ms. Koffler said. "Russia has a huge combat advantage over Ukraine, that has been true from the beginning."
She also criticized the Biden administration and the mainstream media, saying they were creating a fantasy by claiming Ukraine could win the war. Ms. Koffler asserted that any serious military intelligence analyst understood how the war would end from the beginning.
Not everyone agrees, however. Joel Rubin, a former deputy assistant secretary of state under President Barack Obama, warned that excluding European allies from the talks could prevent a lasting deal.
Mr Rubin said a deal without European participation would be difficult to implement and unlikely to lead to a lasting resolution to the conflict. “Bringing European leaders into the negotiations may be more complicated than it initially appears, but the benefit of their involvement is that they share the costs of any commitments that arise from the negotiations,” Mr Rubin said.
Still, Ms. Koffler believes Mr. Trump is the only leader with the courage and ability to handle difficult negotiations with Mr. Putin. “Mr. Trump is the only one who is willing to admit reality — he is not afraid to be blamed for losing the war and ceding victory to Mr. Putin,” Ms. Koffler said.
According to her, Mr. Trump will probably offer Mr. Putin what he wants: Ukraine not to join NATO, Russia to keep control of eastern Ukraine and Crimea, no US troops in Ukraine, and maybe even accept Ukraine to join the G8.
All of this could be aimed at saving the rest of Ukraine and its people, and convincing Mr Putin to come to the negotiating table. But Ms Koffler also stressed that Mr Putin may not accept anything Mr Trump offers, as the negotiations would be extremely complicated from the start and Mr Putin would almost certainly play “hardball”.
In this situation, inviting European leaders to join in may be ineffective and only make an already fragile peace deal more unlikely to be achieved.
Ngoc Anh (according to Fox News, Reuters)
Source: https://www.congluan.vn/chuyen-gia-ong-trump-dung-khi-loai-tru-chau-au-khoi-dam-phan-ukraine-post335005.html
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