Why Trump is siding with Ukraine, for now — FourSight interview

[0:00] Donald Trump maybe is shifting his mindset [0:02] because perhaps he sees Ukraine as now the winners. [0:05] I was told exactly that, [0:06] that this isn't that he's changed his mind [0:09] about Putin and Russia and authoritarianism and aggression, [0:12] but that he likes to go with the winner. [0:14] That's Senator Chris Coons, [0:15] a senior Democrat on the Foreign Relations Committee, [0:18] a strong supporter of US aid to Ukraine, [0:20] and regular visitor to the country since the war began. [0:23] He's describing in his own words [0:25] what he thinks is driving President Trump's position [0:28] on Vladimir Putin, Volodymyr Zelensky [0:29] and the war in Ukraine right now. [0:31] And it's not that the president is experiencing [0:33] some sort of big ideological shift, [0:35] moving away from Russia towards Ukraine. [0:37] He thinks that the president is being dictated [0:39] by what he's seeing on the battlefield. [0:41] In our most recent foresight, [0:42] we explained how Ukrainian drone strikes [0:44] are taking the war to Russia's heartlands. [0:48] Ukraine's aim isn't just to destroy military targets, [0:50] but to disrupt the supply chains [0:52] that keep Russia's army fighting [0:54] and inflict damage across the whole nation's economy [0:56] and bring the consequences of the war closer to home. [0:59] But while we look at how Ukraine has found an edge in its offensive, [1:02] we dig also into their major weaknesses too. [1:06] Russia continues to bombard Ukrainian cities with ballistic missiles, [1:09] and Kyiv needs more US-made Patriot air defences to defend them. [1:14] At the NATO summit, Trump suggested letting Ukraine have that technology. [1:19] We're going to give a licence to you to make Patriots. [1:22] That's pretty cool, right? [1:23] So I'm speaking with one of the key politicians [1:26] pushing for further US support for Kyiv. [1:29] Can Ukraine get those Patriot air defences they so desperately need? [1:32] Can Congress persuade the president to ratchet up pressure on Russia? [1:36] Those are some of the questions I put to Senator Chris Coons, [1:39] lovely to meet you in this special interview for Foresight. [1:44] Senator Coons, President Zelensky says the shortage of Patriots [1:47] is Russia's last major advantage. [1:50] President Trump has floated letting Ukraine build perhaps their own Patriots. [1:54] That was at the NATO summit. [1:56] But it was quite vague and that would take years. [1:58] How can Ukraine or can it survive without Patriots? [2:01] Ukraine has remarkably survived day after day of brutal bombardment [2:06] by advanced hypersonics and ballistic missiles. [2:10] They've been taking the punishment in terms of lost lives, [2:13] in terms of damage to their energy grid and to civilian apartment buildings and infrastructure. [2:19] They would do much better if they had more Patriot interceptors. [2:24] They've got lots of launchers. [2:25] The issue is the PAC-3 missiles, which they've come down to a very, very low number. [2:30] They are very capable at tracking, intercepting and knocking down Shahed drones, [2:37] which Iran has manufactured for Russia in huge quantity. [2:41] It is the much more exquisite, expensive and rare ballistic missiles that they cannot intercept [2:47] without PAC-3s. [2:48] I think we should be sending them to them as quickly as possible because Ukraine has the [2:53] momentum on the battlefield. [2:55] And a combination of the Trump administration actually imposing sanctions on Russia and the [3:01] buyers of Russian oil and on sanctions evaders and giving Ukraine the PAC-3 interceptors they need [3:08] and deserve could resolve this war in a matter of weeks, if not months at the most. [3:11] Is there any chance of the Trump administration giving those PAC-3s? [3:15] Chance, yes. [3:16] Am I confident they will know? [3:18] Because every time Trump suddenly becomes persuaded that maybe we should side with those who are [3:23] fighting for freedom, Zelensky and the Ukrainians, he has a call with Putin and changes his mind again. [3:28] But as of the NATO summit in Ankara, Zelensky was very optimistic. [3:33] What they were essentially, what the president and his defense national security team was presenting was, [3:38] here's what we've been able to accomplish in Crimea in a month. [3:42] We think we can accomplish the same thing much more broadly, much more deeply in Russia [3:48] and force them to the negotiating table on favorable terms in three months. [3:52] And here's what we need to do that. [3:54] You'd always told, for example, President Biden to allow Ukraine to strike inside Russia, [3:58] and he'd resisted that. [3:59] Yes. [3:59] Ukraine are now showing resolve ingenuity when it comes to drones. [4:04] They're striking inside Russia. [4:05] In some ways, they were restrained before because America were telling them no. [4:09] They were allowed under the Biden administration to strike inside Russia, but in a limited range. [4:14] President Biden and his senior foreign policy national security team had real concerns about [4:19] escalation. [4:20] He had access to intelligence on the Russians, and they're thinking that I didn't. [4:24] Was that a mistake? [4:25] That he had access to intelligence? [4:27] No, he was the president. [4:28] To not allow Ukraine to have made these strikes, which we are now seeing, [4:31] makes so much difference to really threaten the Russian economy, the Russian citizens. [4:36] There is a balance that any president has to make between concern about escalation, [4:40] given Putin's massive inventory of nuclear weapons, and repeated public expression [4:46] of a willingness to do so, and a desire to shorten the war and to allow the Ukrainians to win. [4:52] I've consistently advocated for more weapons earlier with more range. [4:56] Senator Coons has supported Ukraine since the outbreak of the war, when President Biden, [5:01] once a senator from Delaware, just like Coons, gave his full backing to the cause. [5:05] During the Biden administration, more than $170 billion of weapons and humanitarian aid [5:11] was given to Ukraine. [5:12] Please welcome President-elect Donald J. Trump. [5:16] When Donald Trump came to power, things changed dramatically. [5:20] This famous meeting at the White House in February last year marked a decisive shift, [5:24] with Trump subsequently suspending all military aid to Ukraine. [5:28] You're gambling with World War III. [5:30] Six months later, he invited Putin to Alaska, hoping to broker a ceasefire, but it didn't work. [5:35] We haven't quite got there, but we've made some headway. [5:38] The US still refuses to supply direct military support to Kyiv, [5:42] only allowing hardware to be bought by its NATO allies and sent to Ukraine. [5:47] Europe has stepped in to fill that gap, and Ukraine has leaned harder on drone warfare [5:51] to hold the line. [5:54] Now, Senator Coons and his colleagues have passed a new sanctions bill against Russia, [5:58] with the measure receiving bipartisan support. [6:01] Your proposed Russian sanctions bill is promising bone-crushing pressure on Moscow, [6:06] but we've seen before that Russia has managed to dodge existing sanctions [6:09] by rerouting oil exports through third countries. [6:12] What's different this time with this bill? [6:15] And why should anyone, in particular Ukraine, believe that this one will work? [6:19] Well, at the end of the day, the will of President Trump to actually [6:24] use the sanctions authority he has, or new authorities this bill, if passed, would give him, [6:29] his will to actually impose costs on Putin and Russia is what's most important. [6:33] I do think having a strong bipartisan bill that passes Congress and goes to his desk and says, [6:40] over to you, Mr. President, is a bit of a forcing mechanism. [6:44] This bill would strengthen his hand in terms of imposing both sanctions and tariffs on the major [6:50] importers of oil and gas and the major facilitators of sanction evasion. [6:55] But frankly, President Trump has only imposed significant secondary sanctions [7:01] on the Russian oil and gas sector once, and there was big movement quickly as a result. [7:06] I just think he needs to use the authorities he's got. But if giving him additional authorities, [7:11] frankly, in memory of Senator Graham, and as a way to push with a bipartisan message, [7:17] I think would be a positive. President Zelensky specifically said, [7:21] passing this bill and getting your president to sign it would, if nothing else, help strengthen [7:27] the morale and the momentum of the Ukrainian troops fighting every day. [7:30] Is your concern, though, still that even if the mood music is that President Trump is changing [7:35] his opinion, that might be different in another month or two? [7:38] Of course. [7:39] And that makes your job in many ways impossible, does it not? [7:44] Challenging. [7:45] Challenging. [7:46] It's hard to chart a course on where President Trump will be. I'll remind you, [7:53] a generational bill for housing policy passed the House, passed the Senate, big bipartisan vote. [7:59] I was in local government, provincial or county government before I got here. [8:04] This would have been a significant game changer in housing policy. And there was a great big signing [8:09] ceremony all set up. And Trump was saying how this was great. And it was going to, you know, [8:13] fight housing costs. And then he changed his mind, canceled the bill signing, started denouncing it, [8:19] refused to sign it. It has become law without his signature, a very rare thing in modern American [8:25] legislative history. But it's a reminder how mercurial he can be, even on something like [8:30] housing costs that polls as a very broad concern across the country. So predicting where he's going [8:37] to be on Ukraine and Russia and sanctions is every bit as hard as predicting whether he's going to sign [8:42] a bill championed by his own party. [8:44] Often when I've spoken to other European leaders and figures about the war and how it might possibly end, [8:50] they've often said it will end in Moscow with a change there. Your sanctions bill is aimed at [8:56] oligarchs, for example, and we've seen some like Andrei Malnichenko come out and call for the war to [9:01] end. Is that significant? Do you think that potentially the oligarchs, the elites around Putin [9:06] could be trying to move to force him not to escalate, not to mobilize, to actually try and reach some [9:12] sort of diplomacy? [9:13] I think that's entirely possible. Look, the costs and the consequences of the war [9:18] have been kept carefully away from the centers of power in Moscow and St. Petersburg. [9:23] And part of what has such impact of Ukraine's recent successful long-range drone strikes [9:29] isn't just that they're taking out major oil refineries. It's that the residents of Moscow and [9:35] St. Petersburg are in very long lines for petrol and seeing huge explosions and flames. There is no [9:41] better defended place in all of Russia than Moscow. And the fact that the May Day Parade had to be [9:47] shortened and because of fear that the Ukrainians would strike critical munitions and critical [9:55] military capabilities, the Ukrainians are hitting the Russians in ways that are now being noticed [10:01] in the capital. And that matters. [10:04] Is there an irony here, though, that the minute the Trump administration came in and started to, [10:10] you know, withhold funding and support for Ukraine, that's when we've seen Ukraine step up when it [10:15] comes to drones, step up to their own ingenuity, really start winning on the battlefield. There's [10:19] an irony, is there not that it took American support to ebb away, American threats of saying, [10:25] don't strike too far into Russia, for Ukraine to get the upper hand? [10:28] I'm not sure I buy that causal link. Remember that, yes, Trump scared and upset and alarmed all of us by [10:34] briefly withholding intelligence sharing and largely withholding munitions. Europe stepped up. I was at [10:41] the NATO summit in The Hague last summer, and it was perfectly clear that our European allies and Canada [10:48] said, Russia's a real threat. We cannot afford to step back and made and have kept serious commitments [10:56] about providing munitions and funding and partnership. There is a Pearl program that through which [11:02] European funds purchase American weapons and munitions, and they're delivered to Ukraine. [11:07] But that pivot was one where it's not as if America withdraws and then Ukraine finds its moxie. [11:14] America became less fully supportive. Europe really stepped forward. And Ukraine has managed to win [11:22] the day so far on the battlefield. And I'm very optimistic now that Ukraine can end this war on just and [11:28] durable terms. If Democrats took the House and the Senate in November, what could you do to really [11:34] change things for Ukraine, if anything? Or what could you force the administration to do? Would November [11:39] change things? Hopefully it will. But there is broad bipartisan support for Russia and Ukraine to be [11:47] brought to a just conclusion by actively and affirmatively supporting Ukraine in the Senate. [11:53] I have been struck at meeting after meeting how senior Republican senators have really pushed the [11:59] Trump administration on why are you not spending? Why are you not partnering? Why are you not helping [12:04] us learn the lessons of this war? So if we had the majority, we'd have more tools to use. But frankly, [12:14] it says something about Trump's intransigence and his commitment to supporting Putin rather than supporting [12:21] the free people of Ukraine, that he has resisted so much pressure. And his military leadership has [12:27] resisted so much pressure from his own party's leadership. Senator Coons, thank you very much [12:32] for your time. Thank you. Thank you very much to Senator Coons for all of his time and his expertise, [12:40] and to his staff for making the interview happen, in particular to Maddy. What did you make of what he [12:45] said? Do you agree that President Trump is mercurial? And do you think that more U.S. support could be [12:49] really decisive when it comes to this conflict? Let us know what you think. And as always, [12:54] make sure you subscribe for the next episode of FulSite.