The Kremlin is nodding along with President Donald Trump’s recent campaign calling for new Ukrainian leadership, assuring the White House they “fully agree” with his frustrations as they seek to use the U.S. midterm elections to their advantage.
Trump repeatedly expressed his contempt for Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky on Thursday, calling the leader “not a good guy for us to deal with” and accusing him of having “destroyed that country.” Earlier in the week, Trump called on Zelensky to step down and hold wartime elections, and U.S.-provided Starshield satellite systems in Ukraine experienced a mysterious lapse in access.
Russian President Vladimir Putin and his government have seized this moment to profess full alignment with the White House — blaming the invasion of Ukraine on Zelensky and praising Trump’s decision to alleviate some sanctions to drive oil prices down ahead of Election Day next month.
“The fact that Zelensky doesn’t want to take responsibility and enter a peaceful settlement process is unambiguous,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told the press on Friday. “Here, we fully agree with President Trump’s point of view.”
“[Zelensky] doesn’t want to settle. He says he wants to settle, but he doesn’t,” he added.
Lt. Gen. Richard Newton, former assistant vice chief of staff for the U.S. Air Force, told the Washington Examiner “there’s no doubt Putin is exploiting the current U.S. midterm elections to gain an advantage on the battlefield.”
Earlier this week, when Trump unilaterally declared an “energy ceasefire” prohibiting strikes on oil facilities and energy infrastructure, Ukraine immediately signed on. Russia did not, almost immediately launching strikes against energy targets in Ukraine. When Zelensky responded by abandoning his side of the aborted ceasefire, Trump began demanding he step down as a leader.
It has been a remarkable display of political jiu-jitsu by the Kremlin, seamlessly transforming explicit opposition to Trump’s ceasefire into agreement that Zelensky is their common foe.
“Mr. Putin is conducting two wars simultaneously — a military war against Ukraine and an information war aimed at dividing the West, weakening our resolve, and convincing us that somehow Russia is the victim,” Gen. Philip M. Breedlove, former commander of U.S. European Command and NATO supreme allied commander Europe, told the Washington Examiner.
Trump is now saying Zelensky is the main obstacle to reaching a settlement in the region, characterizing him as a stubborn leader uninterested in peace.
“If they’re going to end up with a settlement of some kind, they’re not going to do it with [Zelensky],” Trump told Newsmax on Friday. “He doesn’t want to settle. He says he wants to settle, but he doesn’t.”
Meanwhile, Trump has invited Russia to sell approximately 1.8 million tons of diesel on the international market in a bid to drive down energy prices ahead of the U.S. midterm elections — a welcome reprieve from the crippling sanctions that have contributed to Russian economic turmoil.
“Somehow, these lies seem to have swindled Washington into capitulating on a diesel deal. President Trump is right to want an end to this war, but by providing this kind of economic relief, the United States is now extending it,” said Carrie Filipetti, executive director of the Vandenberg Coalition and former deputy assistant secretary at the State Department. “We have enormous economic leverage over Moscow, and it’s time to use it to force Putin to the negotiating table from a position of weakness, not strength.”
She added: “This diesel deal won’t help Americans with their gas prices, but it will result in precisely what Trump claims to want to stop: a continuation of this war, now bankrolled by the U.S.”
Despite foreign officials in Europe reportedly urging Zelensky to temper down the confrontational position with the White House, the Ukrainian leader seems to have accepted the fact that Ukraine is “losing a strong partner.” And he has instead heaped praise on foreign leaders who have been more reliable in their material and political support.
“I’m so thankful that we have such huge support from the EU Council, commission, and leaders — real leaders — so that they stay with us from the very beginning of this war,” Zelensky said at a summit in Belgium on Friday.
Officials in the United Kingdom, in particular, have declared their intention to be a “bridge” between the United States and Ukraine, hoping to pull their two allies “back together” amid the treacherous breakdown in relations.
