{"id":289273,"date":"2025-04-24T12:49:05","date_gmt":"2025-04-24T12:49:05","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/2025\/04\/24\/if-america-walks-away-from-ukraine-what-will-europe-do\/"},"modified":"2025-04-24T12:49:05","modified_gmt":"2025-04-24T12:49:05","slug":"if-america-walks-away-from-ukraine-what-will-europe-do","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/2025\/04\/24\/if-america-walks-away-from-ukraine-what-will-europe-do\/","title":{"rendered":"If America Walks Away from Ukraine, What Will Europe Do?"},"content":{"rendered":"<div style=\"text-align:center\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/i2.wp.com\/static01.nyt.com\/images\/2025\/04\/24\/multimedia\/24int-europe-ukraine-trump-01-qwtj\/24int-europe-ukraine-trump-01-qwtj-facebookJumbo.jpg?ssl=1\" class=\"attachment-post-thumbnail size-post-thumbnail wp-post-image\" alt=\"If America Walks Away from Ukraine, What Will Europe Do?\" title=\"If America Walks Away from Ukraine, What Will Europe Do?\" \/><\/div><p> <br \/>\n<\/p>\n<div data-testid=\"companionColumn-0\">\n<div class=\"css-53u6y8\">\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">European allies of the United States have been trying to convince President Trump of the virtues of a shared approach toward ending the war in Ukraine, to enhance leverage on both Moscow and Kyiv and to preserve European security.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">But Mr. Trump and Vice President JD Vance <a class=\"css-yywogo\" href=\"https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2025\/04\/23\/world\/europe\/ukraine-cease-fire-talks-london.html\" title=\"\">insisted<\/a> on Wednesday that a set of proposals that their administration presented to the Europeans and Ukraine last week was now a kind of ultimatum, with the United States increasingly prepared to walk away. European officials who saw those proposals as too favorable to Russia and President Vladimir V. Putin face a dilemma.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">If Mr. Trump sees Ukraine as just another crisis to fix or not, an obstacle toward a normalized diplomatic and business relationship with Mr. Putin, Europeans see the future of Ukraine as fundamental. At stake, European officials and analysts say, is the key principle of European security for more than 50 years \u2014 that international borders, however they were drawn after the end of World War II, should not be changed by force.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">And those countries say they are prepared to keep supporting Ukraine should the Americans walk away.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<aside class=\"css-ew4tgv\" aria-label=\"companion column\"\/><\/div>\n<div data-testid=\"companionColumn-1\">\n<div class=\"css-53u6y8\">\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">\u201cMy sense is that Europe understands the stakes, and that Europe will continue to support the Ukrainian government,\u201d Foreign Minister Radoslaw Sikorski of Poland said in an interview. \u201cAnd Poland certainly will, and we\u2019re not the only ones.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<aside class=\"css-ew4tgv\" aria-label=\"companion column\"\/><\/div>\n<div data-testid=\"companionColumn-2\">\n<div class=\"css-53u6y8\">\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">An important core of large European countries \u2014 Poland, Germany, France, Britain, the Nordic nations and the Baltic nations \u2014 all see the security of Ukraine as vital to their own and say they are prepared to continue to aid Kyiv. Even if they cannot realistically help Ukraine drive out the Russians, they want to ensure that Ukraine can keep what it has and can continue to bleed Russia, which has spent the past six months capturing a few villages at the price of scores of thousands of troops.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">Mr. Sikorski cited estimates that the war has cost Russia at least $200 billion and killed or injured almost a million Russian soldiers.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">\u201cThat\u2019s not my definition of victory,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">The Americans provide some key elements to Ukraine, like intelligence, air defense and satellite coverage, which Europeans hope Mr. Trump will continue even if American financial support stops. Yet while \u201cintelligence sharing is important,\u201d Mr. Sikorski said, \u201cthat\u2019s not a strong enough card to dictate a capitulation to Ukraine.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<aside class=\"css-ew4tgv\" aria-label=\"companion column\"\/><\/div>\n<div data-testid=\"companionColumn-3\">\n<div class=\"css-53u6y8\">\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">Mr. Trump argues that realism requires Ukraine to give up territory.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">\u201cMost European leaders agree on the need for some sort of territorial compromise, but not one foisted on themselves and the Ukrainians,\u201d said Camille Grand, a former senior NATO official who leads defense studies at the European Council on Foreign Relations.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">The goal is to enable Kyiv to negotiate for itself an acceptable end to the war, with sufficient security assistance and assurances to deter Russia into the future, ideally with American financial and military help, though without it if necessary.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">In the current American framework deal, Europe and Ukraine <a class=\"css-yywogo\" href=\"https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2025\/04\/24\/world\/europe\/zelensky-crimea-ceasefire-trump.html\" title=\"\">object especially<\/a> to the proposal to recognize Russia\u2019s annexation of Crimea by force. That idea is unacceptable even to Russia\u2019s ally, China, which has refused to recognize Russia\u2019s annexation.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<aside class=\"css-ew4tgv\" aria-label=\"companion column\"\/><\/div>\n<div data-testid=\"companionColumn-4\">\n<div class=\"css-53u6y8\">\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">\u201cIt\u2019s quite shocking to Europeans that the U.S. would walk away since it has been so fundamental in solidifying European borders and security, and that drives a lot of the concern among Europeans about what comes next,\u201d Mr. Grand said.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<aside class=\"css-ew4tgv\" aria-label=\"companion column\"\/><\/div>\n<div data-testid=\"companionColumn-5\">\n<div class=\"css-53u6y8\">\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">The proposed American framework \u201cessentially hands Russia a victory it cannot achieve on the battlefield,\u201d said Fabian Zuleeg, chief executive of the European Policy Center in Brussels. \u201cIt\u2019s an alignment with Russia, a betrayal of Ukraine and of our security.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">To recognize the Russian annexation of Crimea by force, Mr. Zuleeg said, is \u201ca negation of the principles of European peace and puts into question the whole European security architecture since World War II.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">The European effort to convince Mr. Trump that it is Mr. Putin who stands in the way of a deal, and not President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine, appears to have failed, the analysts say. Mr. Trump may indeed decide to give up on the whole problem, as he did with North Korea in his first term when the deal he had envisaged proved impossible.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">Mr. Trump is correct that Ukraine is more important to Europe than to the United States, Mr. Sikorski said. \u201cBut one of our neighbors has invaded another of our neighbors, and therefore we are prepared to invest proportionally more resources, as we have been doing.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">The amount of money Ukraine requires is not enormous given Europe\u2019s wealth \u2014 perhaps 50 billion to 60 billion euros a year (some $57 billion to $68 billion) for financial and military aid, while Europe is already intending to provide \u20ac40 billion this year.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<aside class=\"css-ew4tgv\" aria-label=\"companion column\"\/><\/div>\n<div data-testid=\"companionColumn-6\">\n<div class=\"css-53u6y8\">\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">Still, despite a critical mass of large countries \u2014 presumably including Germany under its new conservative chancellor \u2014 Europeans are divided in terms of practical aid to Ukraine, with some countries like Italy expressing solidarity with Kyiv but not providing much money. Some countries like France and Britain are willing to risk more for Ukraine, proposing sending European troops to provide security assurances, but may have less money to spend than Poland, say, or Germany.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">And Hungary and Slovakia have little sympathy for Kyiv and essentially align themselves with Moscow.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">Mr. Zuleeg is relatively optimistic. \u201cThe major powers in Europe understand the stakes for their security,\u201d he said. And Mr. Trump has prompted new European overtures to post-Brexit Britain, to Norway and to Turkey.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">\u201cThe recognition is there, unfortunately, that Trump\u2019s actions only benefit the opponents of liberal democracy and European security,\u201d Mr. Zuleeg said. \u201cCountries understand that they must step in wherever they can.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<aside class=\"css-ew4tgv\" aria-label=\"companion column\"\/><\/div>\n<p><br \/>\n<br \/><a href=\"https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2025\/04\/24\/world\/europe\/europe-ukraine-russia-trump.html\">Source link <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>European allies of the United States have been trying to convince President Trump of the virtues of a shared approach toward ending the war in Ukraine, to enhance leverage on both Moscow and Kyiv and to preserve European security. But Mr. Trump and Vice President JD Vance insisted on Wednesday that a set of proposals [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":289274,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"tdm_status":"","tdm_grid_status":"","fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/static01.nyt.com\/images\/2025\/04\/24\/multimedia\/24int-europe-ukraine-trump-01-qwtj\/24int-europe-ukraine-trump-01-qwtj-facebookJumbo.jpg","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[11826,163575,896,202,52,1130,128437,163486,6920],"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/289273"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=289273"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/289273\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":289275,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/289273\/revisions\/289275"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/289274"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=289273"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=289273"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=289273"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}