U.S. President Donald Trump and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy finally reached a deal, or at least the “framework” of a deal, on developing Ukraine’s critical mineral reserves. While the details need to be finalized by later agreements, Zelenskyy and Trump agreed to an arrangement whereby the U.S. and Ukraine would jointly manage a fund financed by revenues from Ukraine’s minerals as well as its hydrocarbons, with the proceeds expected to be reinvested in Ukraine.
Trump was clearly interested in securing this deal, largely as a way for the U.S. to, in his words, “recoup” the costs of the military aid it has supplied to Ukraine since Russia’s all-out invasion of the country three years ago this week. But it was Zelenskyy who initially floated a mineral deal as part of the “Victory Plan” proposal he put forward in October. Overall, the agreement appears to be, in the words of Kyiv School of Economics President Tymofiy Mylovanov, “A victory for Zelensky, but also a victory for Trump.”
Perhaps most notable about the agreement is that it came after Trump seemed to pivot U.S. support from Ukraine to Russia on questions about the war. On Monday, the U.S. voted against a United Nations General Assembly resolution condemning the Russian invasion and calling for Moscow to return the Ukrainian territory it currently occupies. That followed two weeks in which the Trump administration had made clear that it was looking to revise, retrench or even, some fear, revoke U.S. security guarantees to Europe. And all of that was on top of a slew of public insults and criticisms leveled by Trump toward Zelenskyy, who responded in kind.
The diplomatic whiplash is a lot to process, and observers are right to be disoriented. While confusing, the events of recent weeks reveal much about the Trump administration’s general approach to foreign policy, its support for Ukraine specifically and its stance on the war in Ukraine as a whole.
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With respect to Trumps’s general approach to foreign policy, it is important to keep in mind that public pronouncements by leaders, especially leaders like Trump, are made in what international relations scholar Austin Carson—drawing on the language of sociologist Erving Goffman—calls the “frontstage.” The statements made in this realm are not necessarily intended for the counterparts of direct negotiations, but rather are a way to communicate with other audiences. In this case, these audiences might be other countries, such as the European nations that are also supporting Ukraine, or the other key party in the conflict, Russia. But there is often also a domestic audience being addressed, and these statements can be a way to “look tough” to one’s base, something that is particularly important to Trump. In short, public declarations in the frontstage are often simply posturing, and that may very well be the case here, too.
As for the war in Ukraine, in addition to being obsessed with the idea of being “repaid,” Trump is fixated on being seen as being the one to broker an end to the conflict.
This is in contrast to the real work happening “backstage”—in this case, the negotiations over the deal, about which we the general public only receive limited information. In general, with negotiations, we see photos of talks. We hear summaries of discussions held by the parties. But we don’t actually see what is happening behind the scenes. Sometimes what happens in the backstage can spill over to the frontstage. That could explain Trump’s above-mentioned tirade against Zelenskyy. The Ukrainian president apparently turned down an initial draft mineral rights agreement presented by Trump administration officials because it did not include explicit security guarantees by the United States. While the ideal for Zelenskyy when it comes such security guarantees is NATO membership, the U.S. position—as expressed by Secretary of State Marco Rubio in a recent interview—is that the economic linkage created by the minerals deal is sufficient to ensure Washington’s commitment to securing Ukraine. Regardless, Zelenskyy’s initial refusal to sign the deal drew Trump’s ire.
This relates to the Trump administration’s approach to supporting Ukraine. Trump has a long and complicated history with Ukraine, going back to his first term as president. In 2019, Ukraine’s military was fighting Russian-backed separatist forces in the Donbas region in a low-intensity conflict that Moscow fomented on the heels of its 2014 annexation of Crimea. At the time, Trump attempted to use the continued flow of U.S. military assistance as leverage to get Zelenskyy to authorize an investigation into Joe Biden’s activities in Ukraine when Biden was still vice president. Trump hoped to use the investigation to smear Biden, who was then widely expected to be the Democratic candidate—that is, Trump’s opponent—in the 2020 presidential election.
While the aid was never cut off, the attempt to use congressionally authorized funds for personal political gain was the basis for Trump’s first impeachment, and that has evidently colored his views on Zelenskyy and Ukraine ever since. Following Russia’s all-out invasion of Ukraine in 2022, Trump—by then no longer president—initially questioned the utility of supporting Ukraine militarily. He eventually shifted his stance to proposing that the U.S. provide aid but be “paid back,” perhaps by converting the aid to loans.
As for the war in Ukraine, in addition to being obsessed with the idea of being “repaid,” Trump is fixated on being seen as being the one to broker an end to the conflict. He made it a central campaign issue in last year’s election. Indeed, one of his more effective campaign lines was to point out that Russia did nothing new, in terms of aggression toward its Ukraine and its other neighbors, when Trump was president. Since his return to the White House, he has repeated his claim that Russia would never have launched its all-out invasion had he, and not Biden, been president in 2022. While that counterfactual is impossible to prove or disprove, Trump went further during last year’s presidential campaign, boldly asserting that he would get Ukraine and Russia on the phone and have the conflict over “in 24 hours” were he to win the election.
That clearly didn’t happen, and as president-elect, Trump acknowledged that reaching a “fair deal” was “complicated.” Nevertheless, he wants a deal badly. This is likely why he and others in his administration are refraining from criticizing Russia and have even begun to instead criticize Ukraine. While some find that unconscionable, it is likely an attempt by Trump to get Russia to see the U.S. as an “honest broker,” even as Washington continues to provide direct financial and military support to Ukraine. Anything that seems to hold up a broader deal to end the conflict, including Zelenskyy standing firm against what he sees as a one-sided offer on Ukraine’s mineral wealth, frustrates Trump. And when he’s frustrated, he lashes out.
Of course, all the back and forth with Ukraine means nothing if Russia isn’t also invested in the negotiations. The need for Trump to position himself as impartial, even while the U.S. actively supports Ukraine, likely explains why the U.S. voted against the U.N. resolution. But even being seen as an honest broker isn’t enough to reach a deal if one side doesn’t actually want one. And as I wrote last week, “it is increasingly likely Trump will find that Russia, and specifically Putin, is not really interested in a deal regardless of what is offered and who is at the table.”
In the above-mentioned interview, Rubio himself acknowledged that it is not yet clear if the Russians are truly interested in ending the war. Putin has a particular fixation with Ukraine and sees domination of the country as central to his mission of restoring Russia’s grandeur as a great power. Yes, he was concerned about NATO expansion, but not because he saw NATO as a threat. Instead, he saw NATO membership for Ukraine as impeding his neo-imperial designs. Given Putin’s mindset, a deal to end the war is not only unlikely, but probably impossible.
Nevertheless, like many other observers before and since, I argued just ahead of the one-year anniversary of the Russian invasion that the war will likely end in a settlement rather than in a clear victory by one side over the other. That scenario has only grown more likely as we now enter a fourth year of fighting, with the battlelines largely static for the past two and a half years. While the U.S.-Ukraine deal is a positive step forward, it remains to be seen whether it is a step along the path that will lead to that ultimate deal to end the war.
Paul Poast is an associate professor in the Department of Political Science at the University of Chicago and a nonresident fellow at the Chicago Council on Global Affairs.
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