Askold Lozynskyj
President Zelensky faces a very challenging conundrum. He either plays along with America’s President Trump or he loses American military support and intelligence sharing. Or he can be straightforward and direct and rely strictly on the Europeans who are stepping up in their support and increasing their capability.
Zelensky has told Trump many times that Putin does not want peace and that he has breached numerous ceasefires even during Trump’s prior term. Trump feigns amnesia or is it ignorance. European leaders have confirmed that opinion on many occasions. Trump denies the obvious alluding to some long term relationship with Putin, perhaps in the KGB.
Trump insists that he wants to stop the killing. Judging by Trump’s indiscriminate support for Israel’s Prime minister Netanyahu and Netanyahu’s approach to killing Palestinian women and children, killing is the least of Trump’s concerns. More than 50,000 Palestinian civilians have been killed in Gaza, mostly civilians. Trump’s concern for the Palestinian people is belied by his own initiative of their ethnic cleansing in Gaza.
Europe is on the doorstep of current and future Russian aggression and has a vested interest in Ukraine and certainly a more reliable ally than MAGA America. But why relinquish lon term American support even though a primitive thin skinned narcissist is in charge temporarily.
Zelensky is an intelligent man as he has shown over and over. Unfortunately the American man in the White House is a neanderthal surrounded by sycophants of his own choosing. His main envoy on the Middle East and Ukraine issues appears to be even worse. Trump’s friend Steven Witkloff recently applauded Putin’s religious devotion, stating that Putin actually went to Church and prayed for the health and safety of Donald Trump after his assassination attempt.
“Russian strongman Vladimir Putin claims he rushed over to his local church and prayed to God for President Trump’s safety after he was nearly assassinated at a rally in Butler, Pa. rally last July.”
Witkoff met with Putin last week while trying to advance peace talks with Moscow and the Russian leader described Trump as a “personal friend” according to the special envoy.
And so Putin prays for Trump and we can assume, perhaps, that Trump prays for Putin although the truth is entirely different. Neither of them has prayed in the last fifty years.
Witkoff has also manifested ignorance on Ukraine’s geography referring to the four regions that Ukraine have to give up as Crimea, Donbas and Luhansk, proving once again that just because you are a billionaire in real estate does not mean that you are well informed or have done your homework.
But clearly Ukraine is in a precarious situation. Its people including women and children are dying, yet its President has to humor and appease an ill elected fraud, retain a semblance of normality because of America’s wealth and military capacity.
But, Ukraine is not alone. Europe and Canada have recognized the immediate problem and they understand that, at least for the time being, it needs to be addressed gingerly. America cannot be treated as an outcast or an enemy. It has to be treated as a friend and shown respect despite the fact that it deserves none currently.
My wife and I travelled to Canada last week. We felt compelled to apologize to great applause among Canadian Ukrainians for the “idiot in the White House.” Frankly I made that reference to both Canadian and American border control. I could not have passed both controls more expeditiously. This assured me that the circus is only a matter of time and with each passing day fewer are taking Trump seriously. Unfortunately, much harm has been done, including the killing of innocents.
I have been informed that some intelligence circles consider Trump’s mediation of peace a futile exercise geared to present his case for a future Nobel peace prize. In the meantime Vladimir Putin humors Trump delivering a portrait of Trump to Trump’s special envoy. Steven Dummkopf opines, “A gracious moment’.
March 25, 2025