Trump Should Make Putin Wince Before They Sit Down to Talk

Excerpt

Amid rising expectations of a negotiated end to Russia’s war in Ukraine, Russian President Vladmir Putin declared last week that “nothing has changed.” He reiterated his maximalist demands for a peace deal: Ukraine must cede additional territories to Russia, abandon all hope of joining NATO, demilitarize, and “denazify”—Kremlin code for replacing the current government. These demands, which are unacceptable to Kyiv, suggest that Putin is confident that the war is trending in his favor.

If U.S. President-elect Donald Trump is to succeed in brokering a peace deal, he must change Putin’s perspective that he has the upper hand, or Trump’s diplomacy will backfire. To go into talks with a strong hand, Trump will need to bolster U.S. and Ukrainian leverage. And he must do so quickly, without the torturous delays and self-imposed red lines that have characterized President Joe Biden’s support for Ukraine over the last three years. The Trump administration should therefore formulate a maximum pressure campaign to convince Moscow to accept a good and lasting peace deal. By keeping his promise to restore “peace through strength,” Trump can give himself the best possible chance of stopping the bloodshed for good.

Mark Montgomery is the executive director of the Cyberspace Solarium Commission 2.0, the senior director of the Center on Cyber and Technology Innovation at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, and a former rear admiral in the U.S. Navy. John Hardie is the deputy director of the Russia program at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies. X: @JohnH105.