Authored by Andrew Korybko via Substack,
The offensive dimension of Trump’s new three-pronged approach to Ukraine involves the sale of American weapons to NATO who’ll in turn transfer them to Ukraine.
This aligns with what Trump told NBC several days prior to the aforesaid announcement.
According to Reuters’ sources, however, “Trump presented a framework - not a fleshed-out plan”, and some of the six countries that NATO chief Rutte mentioned will participate in this scheme allegedly only found out about it during that time.
Other reports then circulated about France, Italy, and Czechia’s refusal to participate on various pretexts ranging from their principled support for the European defense industry, which would struggle to fulfill its potential if EU countries buy more expensive US arms, to simple budgetary concerns.
The resultant ambiguity over the American-NATO arms arrangement for Ukraine that Trump announced accordingly raises questions about what’s really going on.
There are three likely explanations.
Whichever explanation(s) one adheres to, more clarity will be forthcoming from Russian media reports, which will reveal the existence of these new arms on the battlefield or lack thereof ahead of the expiry of Trump’s 50-day deadline. If lots of US arms flood into Ukraine, then it’ll show that there was enough agreement and capacity to back up his threat. If not, then he might blame the Europeans for fumbling it, after which he might only impose some secondary sanctions but no longer militarily escalate.
Trump repeatedly said that the Europeans must step up since this conflict is waged on their continent. If enough prioritize other interests over supporting Ukraine “for as long as it takes”, however, then Trump likely isn’t going to have the US once again “lead from the front”, do the “heavy lifting”, and thus let them keep “freeloading” off of it since that would betray his planned reform of US-NATO relations. The Europeans’ compliance or lack thereof will therefore play a crucial role in the conflict’s future course.