"Trump's 'World': Will he really push for 'Minsk-3' if he wins?"

The leading American Republican, Donald Trump, if he wins the elections on November 5, may propose a plan to resolve the Russia-Ukraine war that will represent a "rethink" of the Minsk agreements. This is reported by the Financial Times, citing a long-time advisor to Trump. An unnamed source for the publication claims that the settlement project he may propose will include enforcement mechanisms and consequences for violating the agreement, "unlike the failed Minsk agreements." At the same time, in his opinion, it should be European troops, not NATO forces or UN peacekeepers, that guarantee the implementation of the agreement. "We will not pay for this. Europe pays for this," said the advisor to the former Oval Office occupant and the Republican Party's presidential candidate.

According to the Financial Times, Trump's allies believe that Ukraine is losing the war, and therefore insisting on a settlement is "morally right." The newspaper writes that Trump allegedly thinks that the current American President Joe Biden should talk to Putin, just as past presidents spoke with Soviet leaders during the Cold War. Additionally, it is reported that Trump believes that NATO membership for Ukraine is not an option in the short term, and therefore this issue could be put off for several years to force Russia to come to the negotiating table. "We are freezing the conflict; Ukraine does not concede any territory, they do not abandon their territorial claims, and we are negotiating with the understanding that a final agreement will probably not be reached until Putin is out of the picture," FT quoted Fred Fleitz, who worked in the White House during Trump's presidency.

It is important to emphasize that during the current election campaign, Trump has openly indicated that he would stop or sharply reduce military aid to Ukraine if he wins the elections on November 5, and during a debate with Democratic candidate Kamala Harris, he refused to directly answer whether he wants our country to win the war initiated by Putin's Russia.

Meanwhile, the head of the Office of the President, Yermak, has voiced his views on ending the war. In particular, in an interview with Corriere Della Sera, the head of the presidential office noted that official Kyiv is ready for negotiations with the Russian Federation not after it withdraws its troops to the 1991 borders, as previously stated in Zelensky's formula, but in the event of the "liberators" retreating to the 2022 borders – that is, before the full-scale invasion.

"We are against freezing the war; we want it to end. We are reassured by the fact that countries of the Global South also condemn the Russian invasion and the forceful seizure of territories. However, to start negotiations, we need to return to the situation that existed before the first shot of the Russian cannon at four in the morning two years ago. Only then will we talk about how to restore our sovereignty to the 1991 borders," emphasized Yermak.

He also stressed that he does not care what Putin says about the need to consider "realities on the ground": "I do not care what this aggressor says! We cannot build a peace proposal under the influence of those who wished for this war. We will be ready to hold an international conference (peace summit – ed.) when we feel strong, and also see support from the Global South for negotiations with Russia." When asked if this means that the peace summit is postponed to next year, Yermak noted: "We do not know; we will do it when the appropriate conditions are met, hopefully as soon as possible."

It is worth recalling that earlier President Zelensky and Yermak himself had allowed for negotiations with the aggressor country within the framework of the second peace summit, which was planned for November. But now, as we can see, the Office of the President clearly indicates that the event is postponed indefinitely.

Commenting on the likelihood of Donald Trump coming to power in the U.S., the head of the Office of the President stated, "We are not afraid of his victory." "We returned from the U.S. with the confidence that none of the candidates wishes to allow Putin to win, and military support for Ukraine will continue," added Yermak. However, people who previously worked with Donald Trump when he was president have a different opinion on this matter. They believe that the Republican will support an end to the war at the front line, negotiations with the Kremlin dictator, and a refusal for Ukraine to join NATO. This was conveyed to the New York Times by foreign policy experts from the Republican Party – Robert O'Brien, who previously served as Trump's national security advisor, and Elbridge Colby, a former deputy assistant secretary of defense under Trump.

Colby stated that Trump is against "post-Cold War foreign policy arrogance." He is ready to "take his rivals into account and is willing to negotiate with them," as well as act based on "flexibility and pragmatism," unlike the current American administration. In his opinion, under the Trump administration, Ukraine should not be admitted to NATO. There should also be a plausible agreement with Russia that would prevent war with the West as a whole.

O'Brien, for his part, says that Trump will not resort to military escalation, but he may "engage in economic escalation and encourage them (Zelensky and Putin – ed.) to reach a resolution." "I would impose sweeping sanctions – not symbolic sanctions – I would impose full sanctions on the Central Bank of the Russian Federation, impose secondary sanctions on Chinese companies doing business with Russia, and reduce the profits that Putin and the oligarchs receive. This may lead them to sit down at the negotiating table with the Ukrainians in a spirit of goodwill. That is one approach," he said.

Elbridge Colby also believes that there will be no military solution for Ukraine from the U.S. because "the Ukrainians are facing very serious issues with manpower, a shortage of ammunition, which is not solely related to willpower but is tied to the production capacities of the Western world." "And ultimately, they will likely conclude a truce somewhere along the line of contact, at the front line, because that is how wars like this end," Colby added. O'Brien, meanwhile, believes that the burden of further arming Kyiv should be shifted to the Europeans: "Germany alone has a larger economy than Russia. Germany could essentially single-handedly address the Russian threat using conventional weapons. In 1988, West Germany could field 12 active divisions on the battlefield."

It is quite telling that similar assessments were recently voiced by Republican vice-presidential candidate J.D. Vance. According to him, our country should give up its territories to end the war. "The Ukrainians will have to make this decision... They are already too exhausted," Vance stated on the News Nation channel. At the same time, he noted that such ideas "are already slipping into conversations with Ukrainian officials, especially private ones": "They say it cannot go on forever. They have no people, they have no weapons, they have no money. And the role of the U.S. is to ask Russia and Ukraine what they need to then impose real diplomacy."

Thus, as we can see, a close associate, essentially Trump’s "right hand," confirms without reservation that if he returns to the White House, he does not plan to continue military support for Ukraine in its current format and will actively impose an end to the war on Kyiv and Moscow, fixing the current front line. Interestingly, as noted by Reuters, Trump is currently behaving like a person who has almost completely freed himself from obligations: "At a time when most politicians are honing their final arguments before the voters, Trump often behaves more like an artist on a farewell tour than a person who is about to lead the most powerful country in the world."

Meanwhile, President Volodymyr Zelensky expressed hope that Donald Trump, if he wins the presidential elections in the U.S., will continue to support Ukraine, as he would not want to lose to Putin. "Trump talks a lot, but I haven't heard him say that he will reduce support for Ukraine," noted the current occupant of Bankova at a press conference during the "Ukraine – Northern Europe" summit in Reykjavik. The current guarantor of the Ukrainian Constitution also assured that official Kyiv "understands all the risks," the greatest of which would be a change in U.S. policy, but despite the identity of the future president, they hope to maintain bipartisan support in Congress. "Not supporting Ukraine, I believe, would be a great victory for Putin and a loss for the West, democracy, and freedom," added Zelensky, simultaneously expressing the assumption that Trump would not want to lose to the Kremlin dictator.