{"id":909,"date":"2025-08-11T19:25:53","date_gmt":"2025-08-11T19:25:53","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.worldpumpnews.com\/?p=909"},"modified":"2025-08-11T19:25:53","modified_gmt":"2025-08-11T19:25:53","slug":"how-trump-can-win-in-alaska","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.worldpumpnews.com\/?p=909","title":{"rendered":"How Trump can win in Alaska"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><\/p>\n<div>\n<p>Unlock the White House Watch newsletter for free<\/p>\n<p class=\"article__content-sign-up-topic-description o3-type-body-base\">Your guide to what Trump\u2019s second term means for Washington, business and the world<\/p>\n<p><iframe class=\"article__content-sign-up-iframe close\" scrolling=\"no\" id=\"signUpIframe\" data-prev-url=\"\/register\/in-article-sign-up?ft-content-uuid=3b2d4c27-1cbb-4758-afb0-d0d191a3167f&amp;newsletter-id=65b8fec772badb00166eafc6\"><\/iframe><\/div>\n<div id=\"article-body\">\n<p>European hopes that Donald Trump had finally tired of being played by Vladimir Putin and was ready to get tough with Russia have proved fleeting. On the day the US president\u2019s deadline passed for the Russian leader to agree to a ceasefire in Ukraine or face harsh economic punishment, he chose instead to invite Putin to a summit in Alaska. Trump still seems to believe only his personal involvement can secure a deal \u2014 and that even an accord that gives Moscow most of what it wants is worthwhile in hope of ending, for now, the bloodshed in Ukraine. The message his western counterparts should be impressing on the US leader is that a bad deal would be ruinous for Ukraine, for European and US security \u2014 and for Trump\u2019s own legacy.<\/p>\n<p>The US president has already handed the Kremlin a gift by inviting Putin to Alaska rather than a third country. An indictee of the International Criminal Court who should be a pariah for the unprovoked invasion of his neighbour is being welcomed onto US soil. There is symbolism, too, in the fact that Alaska was Russian territory before being sold to the US in a real estate deal.<\/p>\n<p>There are still ways Trump could avoid a deeper disaster in Alaska. The guiding principle is that he should not discuss with Putin any matters of Ukrainian sovereignty or territorial integrity without involving President Volodymyr Zelenskyy. Above all, he must avoid any formal recognition of Russian occupation of Ukrainian land. Kyiv\u2019s non-US allies have been rattled by Trump\u2019s hints that there would be \u201csome swapping of territories\u201d.<\/p>\n<p>Zelenskyy has quietly conceded in recent months that Kyiv might tolerate a freezing of the conflict that would amount to continued <em>de facto<\/em> Russian occupation of Ukrainian soil, as part of an accord that respected some of its key demands. But <em>de jure<\/em> recognition would rewrite the postwar settlement in Europe, by in effect legitimising the first redrawing of a European state\u2019s borders since 1945 through a foreign invasion. <\/p>\n<p>Appearing to reward Russia for its onslaught would send a might-is-right message reverberating through Europe and beyond. It might embolden Putin, or a successor, to go further in Ukraine itself or elsewhere. Kyiv could in any case never agree: changing its borders requires amending its constitution via a referendum. Zelenskyy has noted that \u201cUkrainians will not give their land to the occupier\u201d. They might well topple him if he proposed it.<\/p>\n<p>Unlikely as it seems, Trump could yet deliver a \u201cwin\u201d: by securing an unconditional ceasefire that freezes the conflict. Putin may have little incentive to compromise; he is convinced his forces can outlast Ukraine and the west, and loose US talk of land swaps has raised Moscow\u2019s expectations. Yet the conflict is slowly draining Russia\u2019s economic lifeblood, and exacting a vast human toll that even this Kremlin may struggle to sustain indefinitely. Trump should revert in Alaska to his brief get-tough approach, and tell Putin that unless he suspends hostilities, the US will further squeeze Russia\u2019s economy and oil exports and, with its European allies, pour arms into Ukraine.<\/p>\n<p>This is the strategy the US president should have adopted from the outset. Such a ceasefire would leave other crucial issues \u2014 the future of Russian-occupied territory, Ukraine\u2019s armed forces, security guarantees from its partners \u2014 to be agreed later. As in some other conflicts, such as the Korean war, no final resolution may be reached. Either way, however, the aim should be to preserve the independent statehood of Ukraine outside Russian control, and with it western security. It is for this, not for folding to the Kremlin, that Trump should wish to be remembered in the history books. <\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p>#Trump #win #Alaska<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Unlock the White House Watch newsletter for free Your guide to what Trump\u2019s second term means for Washington, business and the world European hopes that Donald Trump had finally tired of being played by Vladimir Putin and was ready to get tough with Russia have proved fleeting. On the day the US president\u2019s deadline passed [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":910,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[727,82,726],"class_list":{"0":"post-909","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-business","8":"tag-alaska","9":"tag-trump","10":"tag-win"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.worldpumpnews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/909","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.worldpumpnews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.worldpumpnews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.worldpumpnews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.worldpumpnews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=909"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.worldpumpnews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/909\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.worldpumpnews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/910"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.worldpumpnews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=909"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.worldpumpnews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=909"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.worldpumpnews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=909"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}