The Bell, 1/28/25

Putin-Trump talks: What to expect

Following Donald Trump’s inauguration as U.S. President, the prospect of Washington brokering a peace deal between Russia and Ukraine has shot up the global agenda. A source with contacts inside the Kremlin told The Bell that a deal is possible — but with many caveats.

Trump’s signals

In his election campaign, Trump promised to stop the war in 24 hours. He missed that deadline, but has made public overtures to Vladimir Putin in which he urged a quick resolution to the conflict, while threatening sanctions if Moscow does not comply. Trump has also been keen to talk up his good relationship with Putin and repeatedly said that he wants to meet as soon as possible.

The new US president has so far issued two key statements. First, Trump called on Putin to end his war in Ukraine, threatening to impose harsh “taxes, duties and sanctions” on everything that Russia sells to the US and “other countries involved.” This threat is hard to take seriously — tariffs on imported goods would not impact Russia in any way due to the microscopic size of its sales to the United States ($2.9 billion in the first 11 months of 2024), while sanctions against third countries were mentioned too briefly to constitute a meaningful warning to China or India to stop buying Russian oil.

Second, following a phone call with Saudi crown prince Mohammed bin Salman, Trump said that he would ask Saudi Arabia and OPEC to reduce oil prices. In Trump’s mind, that should stop the war by “cutting off” Russia’s vital export revenues. However, it is likely Trump has different motives. He would probably be demanding lower oil prices regardless of the war, just as he did in his first term. The Saudis are already planning to boost supplies to the global market, which would push down prices, but have yet to follow through.

The Kremlin reaction

Putin has twice responded publicly to Trump’s signals and his call to stop the war. First, the Russian president deliberately postponed a Security Council meeting to coincide with the inauguration in Washington when the president used the occasion to formally congratulate Trump on taking office (we discussed it here). Then, late last week, in a more substantial intervention, the Russian president told a state TV reporter that he was ready to meet his American counterpart, whom he called “pragmatic”, to “talk calmly.”

Once a meeting gets arranged, the question is what position the Kremlin will adopt — both in Putin’s first meeting with Trump and in any further wider talks on a ceasefire. Putin stated his current official position in June 2024, which has been dismissed by Volodymyr Zelensky as an ultimatum. Putin demanded the withdrawal of Ukrainian forces from four regions that Russia has claimed to have annexed, despite holding only partial control of them (and, in the cases of Zaporizhzhia and Kherson, without having seized the regional capitals). He also insisted that Ukraine renounce its desire to join NATO (enshrined in Kyiv’s constitution since 2019), demanded recognition that Crimea and the territories occupied since 2022 are Russian, and called for the lifting of Western sanctions.

These demands are clearly unfeasible and cannot be accepted by any Ukrainian government. The Kremlin’s real negotiating position will likely be more modest, albeit still unacceptable to Ukraine. A source close to the Kremlin told The Bell which issues are most crucial to Putin, and how an acceptable solution could be found:

• A ceasefire could be established along the current front line. As for the territories that Russia has annexed but does not control, neither side would recognize an official border, but they could agree to resolve this through diplomatic means. Putin may not be against exchanging small areas occupied by Russian troops, such as in the Kharkiv region, in return for something else.
• Ukraine will be expected to announce a status of permanent neutrality (as  proposed in the failed Istanbul peace talks in 2022). Putin is absolutely opposed to Ukraine joining NATO and any deployment of a NATO military base there would also be a red line, the source told The Bell. In mid-January a source told Bloomberg that Russia would insist on a sharp reduction in Ukraine’s ties with NATO. At the same time, NATO countries can continue to supply Ukraine with weapons, but these must not be used against Russia or in any attempt to regain control over the “disputed territories.”
• Security guarantees for Ukraine, which should form part of any deal, remain a  difficult area. The Bell’s source does not believe the strong peacekeeping force described by Trump and Zelensky will come about: no country is willing to face down a nuclear power over the fate of Ukraine, they said. “This means that Ukraine will have to accept there can be no meaningful guarantees. The negotiations would have to come up with some kind of formula that at least resembles a guarantee.”
• Russia may also pursue some of the demands from its full “wish list”, particularly in respect of limiting the size of Ukraine’s army, lifting some sanctions and restoring the Central Bank’s frozen assets in the west.

In general, according to The Bell’s source, Putin is prepared for any eventuality. If he needs to fight another year, or five, he is ready. If he sees a chance to reach a favorable settlement, he will take it. In this sense, the success of any negotiations will depend on the Americans, and how far they will push Ukraine to agree to terms acceptable to Putin, The Bell’s source summarized.

Why the world should care:

Trump’s inauguration has brought a radical turn in Washington’s attitude to the war. The United States is now seeking a swift resolution, and endless prolongation via ongoing military aid to Kyiv is off the agenda. There is a good chance that Russia will be able to keep, de facto if not de jure, a large part of occupied Ukrainian territory, if not all of what it has seized. If that is the general shape of the deal, then Putin and Russia’s propaganda machine will be able to hail a glorious victory not just over Ukraine, but over the “collective west.”

Bloomberg News, 1/21/25

Russia’s budget revenue rose to a record high last month even after the US targeted the banking sector with a new round of sanctions aimed at disrupting foreign trade payments and curbing proceeds from exports.

Total revenue in December reached more than 4 trillion rubles ($40 billion), up by 28% compared with the same month of the previous year, according to Bloomberg calculations based on Finance Ministry data published late Monday. That’s the highest level recorded in ministry data that starts from January 2011.

The US and its allies have been seeking to stop the Kremlin’s war machine by limiting export revenues and imposed more sanctions on Russia’s energy industry and banks that service it late last year. That triggered a collapse in the ruble and depressed Russia’s foreign trade in December. Exports dropped by 19% last month compared to the previous year, and imports shrank by about 8%, according to central bank data published on Tuesday.

Still, oil and gas income spiked by a third in December from the previous year and increased by 26% for 2024, according to the Finance Ministry, while other sources of revenue posted a similar advance for the full year due to taxes and dividends amid robust economic growth.

“The volume of non-oil and gas revenues in 2024 significantly exceeded estimates in the 2025-2027 budget law, including from the largest tax sources,” the Finance Ministry said in a statement….

Read full article here (behind paywall).

YouTube link here.

By Dave DeCamp, Antiwar.com, 1/27/25

The Kremlin said Monday that Russia is ready for contact between Russian President Vladimir Putin and President Trump but hasn’t received any requests for such talks from the new administration.

“We haven’t received any signals from the Americans yet,” said Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov, according to Russia’s TASS news agency. “This is why we continue working according to schedule, maintaining readiness [for dialogue].”

Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergey Ryabkov made similar comments, saying the only contacts between the US and Russia are being carried out at the embassy level. “As the Russian President has repeatedly said, we are open to dialogue and contacts, conversations and meetings,” Ryabkov said.

On the campaign trail, Trump pledged to end the war in Ukraine within 24 hours, but fighting continues to rage across the frontlines. The Wall Street Journal reported last week that Trump has given his envoy to the conflict, Keith Kellog, 100 days to reach a deal.

Trump recently criticized Zelensky, saying that he “decided to fight” Russia instead of making a deal. The comments signaled that the Trump administration might be willing to put pressure on Zelensky to get him to negotiate with Russia, but it’s unclear what sort of deal Washington will be willing to offer Moscow.

Trump’s State Department has paused foreign aid for 90 days, with exemptions for Israel and Egypt, but the freeze does not appear to impact US weapons shipments to Ukraine that go through the Pentagon.

***

Ukrainian Military Intel Chief Warns of Threat to Ukraine’s Existence if Negotiations With Russia Don’t Start

By Dave DeCamp, Antiwar.com, 1/27/25

Kyrylo Budanov, the head of Ukraine’s military intelligence, has warned that if negotiations to end the war with Russia don’t begin by this summer, Ukraine’s “very existence” will be threatened.

According to a report from Ukrainska Pravda, Budanov issued the warning during a closed-door meeting of Ukraine’s parliament.

A source who attended the meeting told the media outlet that Budanov was asked how much time Ukraine has, and he replied, “If there are no serious negotiations by the summer, dangerous processes could unfold, threatening Ukraine’s very existence.”

Describing the response to Budanov’s comments, the source said, “Everyone exchanged uneasy glances and fell silent. It seems like everything depends on things going right.”

Budanov’s comments come as the new Trump administration has declared that its official policy is to seek the end of the war in Ukraine. But so far, there’s been no sign that negotiations have started.

In the meantime, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has been floating ideas for a potential peace deal that would be non-starters for talks with Moscow, including a proposal for 200,000 Western troops to be deployed to Ukraine to enforce a ceasefire.

Budanov’s comments reinforce the fact that time is on Russia’s side, meaning Moscow is unlikely to agree to any deals that don’t include its core demands: Ukrainian neutrality and continued Russian control of the territories it has captured in Ukraine.

By James Carden, The American Conservative, 1/16/25

It started out rather differently than we now sometimes imagine it. When Vladimir Putin took over the Russian presidency from Boris Yeltsin 25 years ago, on New Year’s Eve 1999, he was seen as a man with whom Washington could do business. 

President Bill Clinton lauded Putin’s accession to the presidency as a “democratic transfer of executive power,” which it certainly was not. Clinton administration officials hailed Putin as “one of [Russia’s] leading reformers” who, according to the New York Times, “clearly has an intellectual grasp of democracy.” The “prospects for meaningful reform in Russia,” opined another journalist, “are now excellent.” Administration officials also dismissed worries over Putin’s KGB background as “psychobabble.”

In the aftermath of the September 11 attacks, a Carnegie Endowment expert who has since become one of Putin’s most public critics wrote that, in his view, 

U.S.–Russian relations offer one bright counter to this otherwise gloomier international picture. Russian President Vladimir Putin was one of the first foreign leaders to speak directly to President Bush. In that phone call, he expressed his condolences to the president and the American people and his unequivocal support for whatever reactions the American president might decide to take. He then followed this rhetorical support with concrete policies.

Expectations for an era of heightened U.S.–Russian cooperation began to unravel in the mid-2000s. Indeed, future historians (should there be any) will likely come to see the period between 2007 and 2012 as crucial to explaining why U.S.–Russian relations went so terribly wrong. 

The milestones are by now familiar to those with even a cursory interest in this Great Power rivalry. These include Putin’s speech at the Munich Security Conference in February 2007, where he declared Russia would pursue a foreign policy independent from that of the West, and the six-day war in neighboring Georgia in August 2008, during which the Republican nominee for president made the fatuous and equally unlikely declaration that “we are all Georgians now.” It was, however, the grisly rape-murder of Libyan strongman Muammar Gaddafi in October 2011 that did more than most to poison Putin’s view of Washington and the way it does business.

Briefly, then: The Obama administration was able, under false pretenses, to obtain a promise from the Russian government not to veto UN Security Council resolution 1973  “to take all necessary measures to protect civilians under threat of attack” in Libya. The deal was that the Russians would abstain from using their veto as long as the establishment of a “no-fly zone” didn’t morph into a regime change operation. 

Yet after Gaddafi’s very public execution and the American secretary of state’s tasteless celebration of it, Moscow felt that Washington welched on the deal. For Putin, then waiting in the wings as prime minister, this was the likely point of no return. 

If that was his, what was ours?

By 2011–2012, the unelected U.S. foreign policy establishment (which basically calls the shots regardless of whom we Americans send to Washington) had decided that Putin was a man with whom we could not and should not do business. Any sort of diplomatic relationship ended, not with the Maidan coup and subsequent Ukrainian civil war in the spring of 2014, nor with the Russian invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. No, it essentially ended when Putin decided to return to the Russian presidency for a third term. 

The resulting anti-government protests that took place in Moscow after Putin made his intentions clear encouraged the media’s supposedly best-informed Russian analysts to indulge in fantasies of their own devising. And throughout, they were proven wrong. Masha (now “M.”) Gessen declared in the pages of the Guardian that the Russian media had turned on Putin and predicted that the Putin regime was about to “come tumbling down.” The American Enterprise Institute’s Leon Aron, writing in the pages of Foreign Policy magazine, declared, in an article titled “Putin Is Already Dead,” that 

as the Russian protest movement expands and radicalizes in the lead-up to the March 4 presidential election, the key question is not whether Vladimir Putin—and Putinism—will survive. They will not.

In an analysis somewhat further down the sophistication curve, the New Republic’s Julia Ioffe tweeted, “Putin’s fucked, y’all.” 

At just this time, during a brief, unhappy stint over in Foggy Bottom, I learned of a cable sent in by U.S. law enforcement agents who had taken a Russian national with expired papers in for questioning at an airport out in California. With a great, breathless urgency the agents described that they, in the process of interrogation, had learned that Vladimir Putin would, in the view of the man in custody, be coming back to serve as president of Russia for a third term. I thought, What were these Masters of the Obvious so worked up about? Of course he was. Yet my reaction was a bit unfair—after all, what was understandably news to these agents out West also came as an unwelcome surprise to our superiors in the White House. 

Some might recall that around that time the sitting vice president, Joseph R. Biden, was dispatched to Moscow to advise the sitting Russian prime minister, Putin, that if he were in his position, he would not run for a third term. The White House was perhaps unaware that the serious tend to disregard advice proffered by the unserious. By this time however, the president and his comically egotistical chief Russia adviser had convinced themselves that the sitting (and, alas, very temporary) Russian President, Dmitry Medvedev, would be back for a second term, largely, it was assumed, on the strength of his personal relationship with the American president. 

The personal connection between Obama and Medvedev was thought to be real. It was also, for some reason, assumed to somehow matter in the calculus of the man who held the actual power in Russia. 

New to Washington in the summer of 2010, I, at the invitation of a friend from my time as a lowly paper-pusher at Goldman Sachs, was given a tour of the West Wing by an Obama speechwriter. The speechwriter, touted then as the second coming of Ted Sorensen, could not have been more gracious to this stranger from New York, and in the course of the tour, stopped at a picture of his boss and the Medvedev chowing down at Ray’s Hell Burger in Arlington. 

“POTUS,” he said, “really loves this guy.”

I thought, but didn’t say: Oh. Trouble. When U.S.–Russia relations are overly (as they were in that period) reliant on the personal relationship between the two principals, nothing (much) good comes of it. In this case, some good did come of it: the New START Treaty. But Putin’s return to the presidency for a third time dashed widely held expectations that Obama would have four more years with which to work with the seemingly pro-Western Medvedev (and note what a long way in the other direction Medvedev has traveled since then). 

So when Putin did what every serious person knew he was going to do and return for a third term, a decade’s worth of bitter recriminations—from the White House, from Capitol Hill, and from our government-supervised media—followed.

The rest is history. None of it good.