Make no mistake, the real battle in the Ukraine war right now isn’t in the skies over Kyiv or Dnipro where Russian drone strikes have intensified, dramatically, in recent days.
Nor is the slow, grinding progress being made by the Russian army on the brutal frontlines of eastern Ukraine how the conflict, now in its third year, will be decided.
No, the crucial fight being slugged out between the warring parties and their allies is for the ear of US President Donald Trump, who seems increasingly frustrated with efforts to broker peace.
And that’s why his phone call, expected to take place with Russian President Vladimir Putin later today, may be of such pivotal importance.
Moscow and Kyiv are both vying to demonstrate it is the other who is the real obstacle to peace, hoping to swing Trump’s changeable opinion, at least for a while, their way.
European officials say they will also be speaking to Trump ahead of his call with Putin, amid concerns that Trump’s view on the conflict may be shaped by whom he speaks to last.
Just last month, after speaking to Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky at Pope Francis’ funeral, Trump made some of his most critical remarks towards Putin, condemning the Russian leader for launching a missile attack on Kyiv, adding he couldn’t say for sure whether the Russian leader was serious about ending the war.
As long as Monday’s call lasts, Putin – who has refused to accept a 30-day ceasefire demanded by President Trump and agreed to by Ukraine – will have that presidential ear all to himself. He could pour into it whatever business inducements, flattery or poison Putin calculates will work best.
Trump and Putin already seem to share an unshakeable conviction that it is them alone who have the personal authority and skills to settle the Ukraine war, while the Europeans and the Ukrainians themselves will ultimately do as they are told.
Underwhelming talks in the Turkish city of Istanbul last week – the first directly between Russian and Ukrainian negotiators for years – seem to have underlined President Trump’s own sense of centrality to a deal. It has encouraged him to reinsert himself, by calling Putin directly, into peace efforts from which he had only recently threatened to walk away.
The big Ukrainian fear is that the two leaders will cook up their own peace plan over the phone with President Trump – who says he’ll call his Ukrainian counterpart Zelensky afterwards – then potentially seek to impose Putin’s terms under a renewed threat of withdrawing vital US military and economic aid.
President Trump has leverage on Russia, too, if he chooses to use it. With mounting casualties and a strained economy, the Kremlin undoubtedly wants to avoid pushing an angry and rebuffed Trump towards restoring and possibly redoubling US support for the Ukrainian war effort.
As ever, the problem remains that neither Russia nor Ukraine is currently willing to accept each other’s minimum terms, to compromise enough to satisfy the other side.
That doesn’t mean talks – whether direct, face-to-face, or on the phone – are pointless. If nothing else, they can highlight how far apart the two sides really are.
But what may mean is that, even under US pressure, even after a direct phone call with President Trump, both Moscow and Kyiv may still choose to fight on.
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