Washington, D.C.- President Donald Trump said on Friday that he would make a decision about what to do about the war in Ukraine within two weeks. Trump told reporters in the Oval Office that the choice would be to “do nothing and say it’s your fight” or to “impose massive sanctions or massive tariffs, or both.”
The President’s declaration comes after a lot of diplomatic work. He met with President Putin in Alaska last week for a private meeting. He visited with President Zelenskyy and a few European leaders in the White House this week. Trump said he wanted to help make a peace settlement at these discussions. He had also started planning a meeting between the presidents of Russia and Ukraine, which would be followed by a meeting with the three of them.
But it looks like the road to a peace summit will be quite hard. Sergey Lavrov, Russia’s foreign minister, said on Friday that there are no plans for a meeting between Putin and Zelenskyy. Trump said he knew it would be hard and compared the idea of getting the two leaders together to “mixing oil and vinegar.”
There is a “wait-and-see” attitude with Trump’s two-week timeline. He said he would look at how both Russia and Ukraine are acting to figure out who, if anyone, is to blame for the lack of progress. He also claimed he was “not happy” about a Russian attack on a U.S.-owned facility in Ukraine.
Trump has set similar deadlines in the past, but this time he is in a unique position since he has talked to both sides directly. The results of his recent meetings have been hit or miss. He has been quite loud against the war, but he has also been open to Russian suggestions, including one that would compel Ukraine to give up the Donbas territory. European allies and Ukrainian politicians have criticized this, saying that no Ukrainian land should be given up.
For now, the world is waiting to see if the diplomatic work of the last week will pay off or if President Trump will follow through on his promise of harsh economic sanctions.