By Humeyra Pamuk and Simon Lewis
Nov 29, 2023
BRUSSELS/WASHINGTON, Nov 28 (Reuters) – Russian President Vladimir Putin will not make peace in Ukraine before he knows the results of the November 2024 U.S. election, a senior U.S. State Department official said on Tuesday, amid concerns that a potential victory for former President Donald Trump could upend Western support for Kyiv.
Trump, who is seeking reelection in 2024 and is the leading candidate for the Republican presidential nomination, has been sharply critical of U.S. support for Kyiv.
A senior official briefing reporters after a meeting of NATO foreign ministers in Brussels said the alliance reiterated its support for Ukraine knowing that a peace agreement in the next year is unlikely.
“My expectation is that Putin won’t make a peace or a meaningful peace before he sees the result of our election,” said the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss the outcomes of the meeting.
Asked whether they were expressing a personal opinion or the view of the U.S. government, the official said it was a “widely shared premise.”
“That was the context in which the allies all expressed strong support for Ukraine” in the NATO meeting on Tuesday, the official added, without mentioning Trump by name or explicitly saying how the election result would affect support for Ukraine.
A Reuters/Ipsos poll conducted in mid-November showed Trump and U.S. President Joe Biden locked in a tight race, with Trump leading Biden 51% to 49% when respondents were asked to pick between the two. That result was within the poll’s credibility interval of about four percentage points.
Biden, a Democrat, has given massive military aid and other support to Kyiv since Russia’s February 2022 full-scale invasion, but additional funding for Ukraine is being held up by the Republican-controlled House of Representatives.
Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelenskiy earlier this month invited Trump, who has said he could end the war in 24 hours if reelected, to Ukraine to see the scale of the conflict for himself.
Reporting by Humeyra Pamuk and Simon Lewis; Editing by Chizu Nomiyama and Sonali Paul
Thomson Reuters
Humeyra Pamuk is a senior foreign policy correspondent based in Washington DC. She covers the U.S. State Department, regularly traveling with U.S. Secretary of State. During her 20 years with Reuters, she has had postings in London, Dubai, Cairo and Turkey, covering everything from the Arab Spring and Syria’s civil war to numerous Turkish elections and the Kurdish insurgency in the southeast. In 2017, she won the Knight-Bagehot fellowship program at Columbia University’s School of Journalism. She holds a BA in International Relations and an MA on European Union studies.
So, Biden-Trump running at around 50-50, but swing states favouring Trump.
In the U.K., for the first time, a putlerite scum party is polling at 10%.
That is Reform UK (Honorary Chairman Nigel Farage).
Tories : 21%
LibDem : 10%
Greens (aka commies) : 8%
Labour : 44%
Labour is set to win big unless Rishi can pull something out of the bag.
Labour leader Starmer is pro-Ukraine, but he has a significant Tankie element that backs putler.
How is this table element doing?
Do you still have people like Corbyn around?
^Bert
tankie*
Tankies is just a convenient collective pronoun for the Trots, Marxist-Leninists, anarchists and far left socialists, who originally got their name because “in the interests of socialism” they supported the tanks going in to Budapest in 1956 and Prague in 1968.
In other words : “cunts”, as I call them. Unfortunately they were allowed to breed. They can be seen in vast numbers in London, NYC and elsewhere, demonstrating in favour of the Hamas savages. They are Jew-haters, so that’s another reason they hate Zel and Ukraine and love putler.
The opinions of the far left converge exactly with the far right when it comes to putler: adore and Ukraine: hate.
The unofficial leader of the Tankies in the U.K. is JeremIRA CorbLenin and his faction is still active in the far left of the Labour Party, the SWP, the British communist party and various other scum outfits.
Putin will negotiate peace when Ukraine takes back Crimea.
Слава Україна
Слава його героям!
That is unlikely CW.
Ukraine simply has to retake all of Ukraine from the vermin. But that can only be achieved with a HUGE influx of help.
I take my cue from the the one west-based pundit who likely understands the rodent nazi better than any other: Bill Browder, who is close to the top of putler’s kill list.
Bill says that putler will never negotiate and has no reverse gear.
Likely best case scenario: Ukraine retakes all its land, putler or his successor continues the war; thus requiring a Korea-type DMZ provided by the Budapest signatories plus other volunteers.
Nato and the EU continue prevaricating for another decade.
A liberal revolution in putlerstan is as likely as Elvis coming back as president.
I take your point and agree. Yes we want all of Ukraine back BUT if our heroes are knocking on Cromea’s door I’ll bet Putin will want to negotiate or he will be dead.
Mikhail Saakashvili says that if Krym is retaken, putler will be taken also and killed. I doubt it because the rat surrounds himself with obsessive loyalists.
However, if Saakash is right, it won’t much help Ukraine, because another evil fiend will take over.