This is why you don’t try to appease despots like Putin. The only way Trump doesn’t lose face is to double down on his support for Ukraine and give them whatever they need.
I'm not sure that's the takeaway. We still can't tell what Trump thinks the diplomatic solution is. Russia isn't going to give up on their core position because Trump says a few kind words. Russia repeatedly indicated they want a permanent peace. Instead Trump trots out a ceasefire, and Europe is openly preparing to insert forces into Ukraine. Obviously Russia isn't going to go for it. But they don't want to completely reject it either, since they do want to negotiate. So they "hit the ball back" with the part about stopping mobilization and aid to Ukraine. There's still no clarity on what the proposal that both sides could theoretically agree to would be. And I think the key issue here is Ukraine admitting permanent loss of territory. If Ukraine doesn't accept this, Russia won't sign any deal, and this makes any ceasefire counter-productive from Russia's point of view. Perhaps the west in general, and Trump specifically aren't willing to have any deal where Ukraine officially recognizes loss of territory. If so, it's an impasse and this war will have to continue until positions shift. But I think the takeaway is that anyone proposing a negotiated end to the conflict needs to have some sort of clear path to what they envision that solution to be and a way to get both sides to accept it. Trump entered the conversation acting like his intent is to simply get Ukraine to accept Russia's core demands. Then he walks that back and proposes a strange ceasefire. It really seems like he doesn't know what he's doing.









