Trump’s Bold Diplomacy on the Ukraine War and Iranian Nuclear Program Trump unveils bold plans to end the Ukraine war and halt Iran’s nuclear ambitions, warning all sides the U.S. will walk if his offers are rejected. By Fred Fleitz
There was a lot of movement this week on two intractable global security problems when the Trump Administration put forward proposals that defied the foreign policy establishment to end the war in Ukraine and halt Iran’s pursuit of nuclear weapons.
There were predictable condemnations of Trump’s proposals from parties to these disputes, European leaders, foreign policy experts, and the mainstream media. However, Trump officials made clear that they will not agree to endless negotiations on these disputes and are prepared to walk away if the president’s proposals are rejected.
To end the Ukraine-Russia War, Trump officials put forward what has been called President Trump’s final offer to end the war.
Under this plan, Russia would receive formal U.S. recognition of Crimea, which Russia seized from Ukraine in 2014, as Russian territory. Washington would also agree to de facto recognition of Russia’s occupation of territory it seized in the Donbas region of eastern Ukraine. The U.S. would pledge not to support Ukraine’s membership in NATO, lift sanctions against Russia imposed since 2014, and offer U.S. economic cooperation.
Ukraine would be offered “a robust security guarantee” from European military forces. It would also get back part of the Kharkiv province currently occupied by Russia, navigation rights in the Dnieper River, and assistance in post-war rebuilding.
Ukraine reportedly will also have the right to its own army and defense industry as part of a peace agreement. If true, this means the U.S. is rejecting Putin’s demand that Ukraine be demilitarized as part of a final settlement.
Trump’s proposals will be very tough for Ukraine to accept, and it was not a surprise when Ukrainian President Zelensky immediately and publicly rejected the U.S. offering at least de facto recognition of Russia’s occupation of Crimea and areas of the Donbas. Zelensky’s allies in the U.S. and Europe echoed this criticism. Trump replied that the U.S. was not asking Zelensky to recognize Crimea as Russian territory. Trump and Vice President Vance also faulted Zelensky for publicly criticizing the new U.S. proposals, which they said were harmful to the peace process.
Critics of President Trump’s Ukraine peace proposal are arguing that it does not hold Russia accountable for its vicious and unprovoked aggression against Ukraine. Some claimed it rewards this aggression. Although these are principled positions, Trump’s hard-nosed realist plan may be the only chance to end the war. Trump’s plan recognizes facts on the ground that are unlikely to change and offers a chance to get both sides to the negotiating table and end the war.
Trump’s Ukraine peace plan is a gamble. It may bring about an ugly peace, but if it lasts and stops the killing, the concessions in the plan will have been worth it.
Trump is pressuring both sides by stating that if they refuse to seize this opportunity for peace, the U.S. will walk away. At a White House press conference today, Trump did not rule out consequences for Russia if it does not accept this agreement, but did not want to discuss them while negotiations are ongoing.
The Trump team offered another precedent-shattering proposal this week to address the growing threat from Iran’s nuclear program when Secretary of State Marco Rubio announced that the U.S. would agree to let Iran keep a civilian nuclear program and continue to import fuel rods for its one nuclear power reactor but the U.S. also will insist that Iran give up its uranium enrichment program. (See my recent American Greatness articles on this subject here and here.)
This was a significant change in U.S. policy, which reversed the wrong-headed decision of the Obama administration to concede to Iran the “right” to enrich uranium for peaceful purposes in the 2015 nuclear deal with Iran, the JCPOA. Before the Obama administration, both Democratic and Republican administrations refused to support allowing states to start new uranium enrichment efforts because it is very easy to use them to produce nuclear weapons fuel.
Given Iran’s extensive nuclear weaponization activities, including acquiring nuclear bomb plans and enriching a substantial amount of uranium to near-weapons-grade levels that have no peaceful applications, Iran obviously cannot be trusted with a uranium enrichment program. Trump officials have wisely rejected proposals by Iran and its globalist allies that it be allowed to continue to enrich uranium at low levels and keep its uranium stockpile in the country, possibly (and laughably) under Russian supervision.
Iranian officials are claiming their uranium enrichment program is not negotiable. They also are claiming a nuclear deal will be time-consuming to negotiate and want the U.S. to agree to an interim deal under which Iran would be allowed to enrich uranium at low levels. The Biden administration was fooled by a similar interim nuclear deal during which Iran accelerated its nuclear weapons effort. President Trump and his national security officials will not fall for this. The President has offered Iran two months to negotiate a bona fide denuclearization agreement and is prepared to walk away if an agreement can’t be reached.
President Trump has said that nothing is off the table on how he would respond if Iran refuses to negotiate a serious nuclear deal. He has moved substantial U.S. military assets to the region, including two aircraft carrier groups and B-2 bombers. President Trump has also talked about restoring the tough “maximum pressure” sanctions against Iran from his first term that nearly bankrupted the country.
President Trump’s proposals to end the war in Ukraine and the threat from Iran’s nuclear weapons program are serious and groundbreaking offers that neither President Biden nor any other world leader would have made. But they are serious proposals backed up by a decisive and unpredictable president who won’t be pressured into adopting the failed approaches to these conflicts of the past.
Trump’s new proposals also reflect an America First approach to U.S. national security to keep America out of unnecessary wars and exhaust all peaceful options to resolve conflicts short of war before he considers using military force.
Time is short for Russia, Ukraine, and Iran to answer President Trump’s bold proposals. We should know in a few short weeks whether these states want an agreement or whether they wish to risk unpredictable consequences from President Trump.
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Fred Fleitz previously served as National Security Council chief of staff, CIA analyst, and a House Intelligence Committee staff member. He was a member of the CIA Weapons Intelligence, Nonproliferation, and Arms Control Center and served as a U.S. delegate to the IAEA Board of Governors.
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