Former US President Donald Trump has praised Vladimir Putin for deploying Russian troops into Ukraine.
Amid the escalating tension between Ukraine and Russia, on Tuesday, Putin ordered troops into separatist-held parts of eastern Ukraine in what he called a “peacekeeping mission”.
The order came hours after he signed decrees recognising the independence of Moscow-backed breakaway territories of Ukraine — the Donetsk People’s Republic and Luhansk People’s Republic.
Commenting on Putin’s actions, Trump said it was “genius” and called the Russian leader “very savvy” for describing the troops as peacekeepers.
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He accused the Biden administration of being weak and assured the hosts that an invasion would “never have happened” under his own presidency. Trump also praised Putin as a “genius” for sending Russian troops into Ukraine under the guise of “peace keepers.” He stated, “Here’s a guy who’s very savvy.”
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According to The New York Times, Trump, who spoke during a radio show, accused US President Joe Biden of failing to address Putin’s recognition of the breakaway territories.
“I went in yesterday and there was a television screen, and I said ‘this is genius’,” Trump was quoted as saying.
“Putin declares a big portion of Ukraine as independent. Oh, that’s wonderful.
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“Putin is now saying, ‘It’s independent,’ a large section of Ukraine. I said, ‘How smart is that?’ And he’s going to go in and be a peacekeeper.
“That’s the strongest peace force I’ve ever seen. We could use that on our southern border. There were more army tanks than I’d ever seen. They’re going to keep peace, all right. No, but think of it. Here’s a guy who’s very savvy.”
The former US president had earlier said Russia’s invasion of Ukraine would not have happened if he were still in office.
Following Russia’s deployment of troops into Ukraine, the UK announced sanctions for five Russian banks and three of its wealthy individuals.
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Boris Johnson, UK prime minister, said the sanctions were the “first tranche” and “first barrage” of measures in response to Russia’s actions.
Similarly, Biden had said the US will deploy additional troops and equipment to Baltic members of the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO) in Eastern Europe.
Biden also said the US is implementing sanctions on two Russian financial institutions, adding that sanctions would also be imposed on Russia’s elites and their family members.
The US president has warned of more sanctions against Russia if Putin fails to withdraw his forces from Ukraine.
Republicans have long had a toughness fetish. Going back to the early days of the Cold War, its flip side has been the insinuation that Democrats are weaklings ready to sell out the country to its enemies, with the GOP eager to serve proudly and unapologetically as America’s lone defenders abroad.
No one should be surprised that the script has already been updated to account for recent distressing events on the border separating Russia and Ukraine.
Late last week, conservative talk-show host Hugh Hewitt observed in a tweet that “the tyrant Putin invaded Ukraine in 2014 and will do so again in 2022 but did not do so between 2017 and 2020.” Without mentioning his name, Hewitt implied Putin became a pussycat because of Donald Trump’s steadfast leadership as president.
But wait — wasn’t Trump Putin’s lapdog for the entirety of his presidency, famously refusing to say anything remotely critical about him and even siding with Putin’s denial of Russian interference in the 2016 election against evidence provided by America’s own intelligence services?
No doubt realizing the absurdity of the claim, National Review’s Rich Lowry (and others) leapt in a few days later to add a layer of nuance to the assertion. It’s not that Trump was tougher than President Biden, but that he was more erratic: “The sheer unpredictably of Trump, his anger at being defied or disrespected, his willingness to take the occasional big risk (the Soleimani strike), all had to make Putin frightened or wary of him in a way that he simply isn’t of Joe Biden.”
There may be some truth in this revision of the thesis. Trump was indeed volatile, impulsive, and capricious. It’s certainly possible that Putin feared a move against Ukraine could spark a massive military response from Trump.
But it’s far more likely he hoped for something very different. As Jonathan Last pointedly suggested on Tuesday in his newsletter for The Bulwark, Trump expressed his desire on numerous occasions for the United States to withdraw from NATO altogether. He did so while campaigning for president in 2016. He did so as president. And apparently, he even made clear to advisers he hoped to make it a reality after he won re-election in 2020.
Since such a withdrawal is Putin’s fondest wish, it makes far greater sense to suppose his relative restraint during the Trump presidency was a function of a reasonable expectation he might get everything he wanted without having to fire a shot. Only now, with a less … unorthodox American president in charge, has war become Putin’s only means of advancing his more immediate aim of ensuring NATO moves no closer to Russian territory.
Putin didn’t play nice guy from 2017 to 2020 because he was afraid of Donald Trump. He did so because he knew he had nothing to fear from the fanboy in the Oval Office.