Trump’s Rhetoric Gets Results – and drives the war mongers and left nuts

With the March 11 announcement that Washington and Kyiv have agreed on a cease-fire proposal for the Russia-Ukraine war, it is time to take stock of U.S. President Donald Trump’s approach to European and Ukrainian security and correct the record.

In the last few weeks, Democrats, the mainstream media, and U.S. allies have suffered a collective panic attack. They should take a breath, stop overreacting to rhetoric and symbolism, and focus on the results. If NATO allies are spending more on defense in the coming months, and there is a cease-fire in Ukraine—plausible, if not likely, outcomes—European security will be in a better place than it is today.

A few incidents triggered the recent meltdowns. There was U.S. Vice President J.D. Vance’s speech criticizing European values at the Munich Security Conference last month. The United States voted with Russia and North Korea and against traditional allies on a United Nations resolution that condemned Russian aggression in Ukraine and called for Russian-occupied territory to be returned to Kyiv. On Feb. 28, Trump held a contentious Oval Office meeting with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky. Then, last week, the Trump administration cut off intelligence and military assistance to Ukraine.

These events have led officials and commentators to conclude that the United States is siding with Russia and abandoning Europe, pursuing an imperialistic foreign policy, seeking a spheres-of-influence arrangement with autocratic powers, and overthrowing the postwar international order. The Wall Street Journal, for example, reported that the new “European consensus” is that the United States “has switched sides from standing with democracies like Canada, like France, like Japan, and is now standing with dictators like [Russian President Vladimir] Putin.”

This is the wrong take. After all, we have been down this road before. During Trump’s first term, he criticized allies and used conciliatory language toward Putin. Authoritative voices told us that Trump colluded with Russia and could disband NATO.

But in the end, NATO was strengthened, and Russia was weakened. NATO allies spent more on defense than before Trump took office, and new countries joined the alliance. The United States increased spending on the European Deterrence Initiative, deployed troops to Poland, and built two new low-yield nuclear weapons to deter Russia. Furthermore, Russia took territory from its neighbors under forme Presidents George W. Bush, Barack Obama, and Joe Biden—but not under Trump.

Some critics might argue that this outcome was due to responsible advisors who served during Trump’s first term, the so-called adults in the room who reportedly reigned in Trump’s worst instincts. But these advisors are patting themselves on the back for decisions that Trump would have made anyway. No one forces Trump to do something that he doesn’t want to do. And his negotiating approach, as he wrote in The Art of the Deal, is to make extreme threats and demands with the intention of arriving at a reasonable outcome in the end.

This pattern is repeating itself, but it is as if foreign-policy observers have collective amnesia. It takes a willful misreading of the record to conclude that Trump is siding with Russia over NATO. The president’s demands that allies increase defense spending are intended to strengthen NATO—and they are working. In recent weeks, Denmark, Lithuania, and the United Kingdom have announced major spending increases, and the European Union has instituted procedures to facilitate arms production and spending.

Trump’s overriding foreign-policy objective, however, is to end the war in Ukraine. He has said repeatedly that he is a “peacemaker” and wants to “stop the killing” in Ukraine. He has explained that he must act as an “arbitrator” to succeed. Trump signaled clearly on the campaign trail that he would use his relationships with both Zelensky and Putin to negotiate peace, and he said that he would threaten both sides to get them to the table if necessary.

This strategy explains recent events. Trump cannot both demonize Putin and serve as a mediator. As he said during his Oval Office meeting with Zelensky, “You want me to say really terrible things about Putin and then say, ‘Hi, Vladimir, how are we doing on the deal?’ It doesn’t work that way.”

To be sure, Trump has had contentious exchanges with Zelensky before, but the Oval Office meeting was not a planned ambush. The discussion proceeded without incident for 40 minutes and went off the rails at the precise moment when Zelensky challenged Vance about the feasibility of diplomacy with Russia. It is no wonder that Trump and Vance reacted angrily when Zelensky publicly threatened to be an obstacle to their foremost foreign-policy priority.

Trump communicated exactly how he would handle such a situation on the campaign trail. He said, “I would tell Zelensky, no more. You got to make a deal.” The temporary suspension of intelligence and military assistance was designed to motivate Ukraine to negotiate in good faith—and it worked. Trump explained, “I want to know they [Ukraine] want to settle, and I don’t know they want to settle.” (As Ukraine envoy Keith Kellogg said to gasps at the Council on Foreign Relations last week, “The Ukrainians brought this on themselves,” explaining the suspension of aid.)

Lest one think that Trump is leaning toward one side, just wait. Russia is next. Last Friday, he posted on Truth Social to threaten “large scale Banking Sanctions, Sanctions, and Tariffs on Russia until a Cease Fire and FINAL SETTLEMENT AGREEMENT ON PEACE IS REACHED.” The United States can and should greatly ramp up the pressure on Russia, including by seizing Russian frozen assets, if Putin does not negotiate in good faith.

The goal of all this activity is not a reshaped international order. Trump does not stay up at night designing spheres-of-influence arrangements with Putin or Chinese President Xi Jinping. Pundits are awkwardly trying to impose frameworks on Trump that do not fit: He is not an international relations theorist, and his goal is simply peace in Ukraine.

Contrary to the myth that Trump wants to sell Ukraine down the river, he has prioritized a critical minerals deal that would give the United States a strong and enduring economic interest in the long-term security and prosperity of an independent Ukraine. For a businessman skeptical of overseas U.S. troop deployments, this agreement may be a more compelling statement of Trump’s intent than a promise to put boots on the ground.

A more conventional politician would not pursue the goal in the way that Trump has. But Trump is not a conventional politician, and these methods work for him. Indeed, we are settling into a pattern in which Trump makes a provocative statement, people freak out, and the United States arrives at a better place in the end.

Take the recent events around the Panama Canal as an example. For years, a Hong Kong company has operated terminals on both ends of the canal, posing a security risk to the United States, Panama, and the global economy. In his inaugural address, Trump said, “China is operating the Panama Canal. And we didn’t give it to China. We gave it to Panama, and we’re taking it back.” The Associated Press and other outlets reported that Trump was “embracing a new imperialist agenda” and that he was “threatening to seize the Panama Canal.”

But Trump did not send in the Marines. The issue was resolved peacefully a few weeks later when a group, led by U.S. investment firm BlackRock, purchased a majority stake in the ports business of the Hong Kong company, which promises to eliminate the security threat.

Bringing it back to this week’s negotiations, commentators should stop overreacting to the outrage of the day and focus on Trump’s objective: bringing a just peace to the biggest war in Europe since World War II—an outcome that all should support. In contrast, Biden mouthed soothing words, but then war erupted in Europe and the Middle East. I, for one, would prefer good results to good rhetoric.