Let me also restate my opinion, argued in posts like this, that despite a tone markedly different from that of his predecessors, Trump represents greater continuity of foreign policy than either his detractors or admirers recognise. In backing Israel’s expansionism, to tighten US grip on the Middle East, Trump’s crime is to say out loud what Clinton, Bush, Obama and Biden kept under wraps. The Ukraine bloodbath differs in that aims set out in a Rand Report of 2019 1 were more modest. Where an ethnically cleansed Greater Israel furthers US geo-strategy decades in the making, US plans for the Ukraine were more opportunistic: to weaken a rising power thwarted at every turn, before finally doing what she should have done decades ago in pivoting to Asia, by US refusal to allow her to join the West except on terms dictated in Washington.
On Zelenksy’s ordeal at the Oval Office
From the start this was to be a proxy war fought to the last Ukrainian. There’s a whole policy paper where this is spelled out in detail; the Rand Corporation’s 2019 paper, Extending Russia: Competing from Advantageous Ground. Its table of contents shows geopolitical measure number one as provide lethal Aid to Ukraine, and this was begun under the first Trump Administration: increase support to the Syrian ‘rebels’, promote regime change in Belarus, exploit tensions in the South Caucus [South Ossetia and Georgia] reduce Russian influence in Central Asia [Kazakhstan, Armenia and Azerbaijan] and challenge Russian presence in Moldova. They also talk of economic measures to hinder petroleum exports, reduce gas exports and hinder pipeline expansions or just blow up the pipelines, impose sanctions, enhance Russian brain drain.
All are measures to extend Russia. This isn’t about Ukraine; this is about Russia; about a US policy to overextend, encircle, contain and eventually collapse Russia as part of a much wider strategy to preserve American hegemony over the planet. It also includes a containment strategy aimed at China so the US is unlikely to get involved directly in the Ukraine because it also needs to deal with China. The USA has openly said this, including under the current Trump Administration. They explicitly said this back in February. I have repeatedly got over US Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth’s directive to Europe on February 12 2025 in [Brussels]. He told Europe he was not talking about ending the war. He was not talking about peace. He was telling Europe, “you need to take over because we need to take on China. We cannot do both at the same time. We need to divide labor.” He literally said it’s a division of labor; you need to double down on Ukraine while we deal with China and I warned people that if you listen to this directive it tells you everything about America’s true intentions. They have no interest in peace. They told you this all along if only you listened to what they were really saying instead of projecting your own hopes and desires onto the incoming Trump Administration.
Brian Berletic, below (lightly edited)
* * *
- Extracts from the 2019 Rand Report, Extending Russia, are given in my post on the eve of the SMO, Kazakhstan: why is the steppe on fire?