What could break Trump’s indecision?

1. In my view, we should start with the idea that every person has a defining moment in life, a peak, after which their story begins to decline. And I believe Trump passed his peak the moment he became president for the second time. This is a crucial psychological factor: he reached the top of the mountain to do two things — take revenge on those who had cast him down and to reign.

One of the factors in his fall from the mountain was Ukraine. One of the main reasons he suffered (even though U.S. justice proved it to be unlawful and unfounded) was Russian interference in the U.S. elections. I don’t subscribe to conspiracy theories about Trump being a recruited agent. But the psychological factor — “I suffered because of Ukraine, and I could always make a deal with Putin, but they set up both me and Putin” — is very important for understanding Trump’s logic.

In Trump’s thinking, there is a crucial element: he and Putin ended up “in the same boat” because of made-up things that never happened. As unpleasant as that may be for us, I believe this is exactly how Trump thinks.

2. At a certain age, it becomes very difficult to change. And it is extremely hard to shift the mindset with which you reached the peak of your life.

3. For the past four months, Putin has been operating under the logic of “not upsetting Trump” and waiting for the moment to blame everything on Ukraine. Three days of massive missile strikes on Ukraine prompted a “rebuke” from Trump. Immediately after that, Putin scaled down the attacks — the number of Shaheds and missiles decreased (even though these strikes were part of a major psychological offensive against Ukrainians in the context of the summer campaign).

4. I have no doubt that Putin will continue to maneuver and stall, feeding Trump peace memos. But at the same time, he will do everything he can not to fall out with Trump completely.

5. What could influence Trump? I’ll repeat what I’ve said before: domestic politics. Republican voters don’t care much about Ukraine (this is very important for us to understand the process). But they are strongly triggered by the fact that Trump is so soft on Putin. I’m confident Trump will be forced to impose tougher sanctions on Russia because of this. When will this happen? It’s crucial for Putin to stall until Washington’s summer recess. That would give him an almost guaranteed buffer until September. But after that, stalling won’t work anymore, because the U.S. presidential campaign will effectively begin in the fall.

And finally, the U.S. won’t be able not to sell Ukraine weapons. So those fears are clearly exaggerated.

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About the author. Vadym Denysenko, political scientist.

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