At first glance, U.S. Republican Party presidential nominee Donald Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin look to be poles apart.
One is a billionaire businessman in the world’s signal democracy and home of capitalism; the other is an autocratic leader of a kleptocratic state teetering on the edge of outright fascism.
But these two men, in their attitudes to Ukraine, represent a clear, double-barreled threat to the country’s sovereignty and territorial integrity.
Much of Trump’s rhetoric, coupled with the people he surrounds himself with, suggests that he would as president engage in an unaccountable, transactional mixing of business and politics that casts Western democratic values aside in favor of appeasing the Kremlin dictator.
“If we can have a good relationship with Russia and if Russia would help us get rid of ISIS,” Trump told U.S. television network ABC in a July 31 interview, “Frankly, as far as I’m concerned, you’re talking about tremendous amounts of money and lives and everything else – that would be a positive thing, not a negative thing.”
Trump’s comments have ignited indignation in Ukraine, with ex-Finance Minister and U.S. citizen Natalie Jaresko saying that Trump doesn’t operate with the same facts as the rest of the world – including Russia’s military takeover of Crimea and invasion of eastern Ukraine. She has been urging political leaders to denounce his comments, “which are against Ukrainians and Ukraine.”
Trump vs. war in Ukraine
In addition to having a post-Soviet style of doing business, Trump has suggested that Crimeans supported Russia’s annexation. He also sounds oblivious to Russia’s invasion of the Donbas.
“The people of Crimea, from what I’ve heard, would rather be with Russia than where they were,” Trump said. And while speaking to a crowd in Ohio on Aug. 1, Trump said that taking back Crimea could trigger World War III.
Both statements echo those of Putin, who claims that Russia invaded the peninsula to protect the rights and self-determination of Crimeans.
Many of Trump’s other remarks read like a wish list of Kremlin foreign policy aims.
Trump suggested that the United States should end sanctions and warm relations with Russia and start working with the Kremlin against ISIS. He also said that the U.S. would not automatically come to the aid of its NATO allies if he feels that America has not been “reasonably reimbursed.”
Another episode saw Trump representatives remove a provision in the Republican Party platform that would have called for the U.S. government to supply lethal weapons to Ukraine. As of press time, the Trump campaign had not replied to a request for comment.
Trump’s statements have refocused attention on Ukraine and Russia – attention that was partly lost after the signing of the Minsk II peace agreement in February 2015. His remarks have provoked outrage among Ukrainians as well as Democrats and pro-Ukrainian Republicans in America.
Ex-Prime Minister Arseniy Yatsenyuk said that Trump “has challenged the very values of the free world, the civilized world order, and international law.”
The Washington foreign policy establishment was also taken aback by Trump’s remarks.
“There is a nearly universal sense of dismay, people are terrified, this breaks with a 70-year tradition that crosses partisan lines – the commitment to NATO, the commitment to a whole and peaceful Europe, the commitment to vibrant democracies on the other side of the Atlantic,” said Dalibor Rohac, an expert at the conservative American Enterprise Institute. “By and large, this is the greatest domestic political challenge to that very clear line that U.S. foreign policy pursued for many years.”
Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton speaks during a rally on July 30 in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. (AFP)
Putin sets his traps
Ukraine-Russia relations have been complicated and contentious well before Russia invaded Crimea in 2014, despite centuries of economic and social bonds.
The fundamental problem is that Russian imperialists have historically not regarded Ukraine as an independent nation. Putin continues with the dismissive attitude, even telling former U.S. President George Bush during a 2008 NATO summit that Ukraine “is not even a country.”
Since the Kremlin annexed Crimea and launched its war in 2014, more than 10,000 soldiers and civilians have been killed, making Trump’s declaration that “Putin is not going to go into Ukraine” even more detached from reality.
US assistance
If Trump wins and the U.S. curtails support for Ukraine, the consequences would be significant.
By the end of 2016, the United States will have sent to Ukraine military aid worth $600 million, including radar equipment, drones, communication tools, medical aid, expert advice, and training.
One such military program is the NATO exercises at the Yavoriv training ground in Lviv Oblast. There, about 1,800 soldiers from NATO countries have been training Ukrainian soldiers for two weeks in July. Over 2016, the United States is training five Ukrainian battalions (around 2,000 soldiers).
Ukrainian Defense Ministry spokesman Oleksandr Poronyuk said that U.S. training to NATO standards strengthens Ukraine’s army. Before that, the soldiers used Soviet training manuals translated into Ukrainian, Poronyuk said.
Serhiy Zhurets, the head of consulting company Defense Express, said that U.S. military assistance is important to show a united “American-European front in the fight against Russia,” he said.
Zhurets is afraid that Ukraine may lose it if Trump becomes president. The Western aid “lets Ukrainian soldiers understand that they are not alone,” Zhurets said.
Rohac, the American Enterprise Institute expert, said U.S. withdrawal “would be disastrous for Ukraine for its prospect as a member of the community of European liberal democracies. It would encourage Putin to pursue his imperial ambitions in Ukraine and essentially reward him for acts in Crimea and for invading eastern Ukraine.”
Cash rules for Trump
Trump and close advisers behave like Eastern European kleptocrats.
Throughout his career, Trump has benefited from political connections to achieve success and then used his money to buy influence.
One of Trump’s early real estate successes was the 1975 construction of the Grand Hyatt Hotel in New York, but even that project needed a substantial local tax break. According to a story about Trump in The New Yorker magazine, the candidate got the tax break due to the political influence of his late father, who had donated to city officials.
Another case revolves around Trump University – the for-profit chain of schools Trump lent his name to that has been mired in allegations of fraud. The university is now subject to a multi-state lawsuit. Florida was considering joining the litigation but decided to drop its investigation after state Attorney General Pam Bondi received a $25,000 donation from the Trump Foundation through a political committee. Bondi denies any wrongdoing.
Trump’s campaign manager Paul Manafort also has business, political and personal connections in the post-Soviet world.
While working as an adviser to ousted Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych, Manafort got involved with Russian oligarch Oleg Deripaska in a 2008 deal to buy an Odesa telecommunications company with connections to Yanukovych’s Party of Regions.
The deal went south after Deripaska’s $26 million disappeared and Manafort stopped replying to Deripaska’s representatives. But the oligarch did receive an important benefit from Manafort’s side – simultaneously with the Odesa dealings, his firm arranged for Deripaska to meet U.S. Senator John McCain, Republican of Arizona, a relationship that later led to McCain and Deripaska partying on a Montenegro yacht for the senator’s 70th birthday.
Russian relations
Trump has visited Russia throughout his career, from a visit to Moscow in the 1980s, to staging the 2013 Miss Universe beauty pageant in the Russian capital.
On his 2013 visit, he spoke with Russian businessman Aras Agalarov and his son Emin. “(Trump) kept saying, ‘Every time there is friction between the United States and Russia, it’s bad for both countries,’” Emil Agalarov told the Washington Post. “For the people to benefit, this should be fixed. We should be friends.’”
In 2013 and 2014, Trump also made multiple statements that he had “a relationship” with Putin. But last week, Trump backtracked, saying he had never met or had any relationship.
But Trump is far from the only candidate – or American politician – to have ties to the region.
Yanukovych hired former Obama White House counsel Gregory Craig to spearhead an investigation into whether the government’s prosecution of Yulia Tymoshenko violated her human rights.
Democratic Party candidate Hillary Clinton controls the Clinton Foundation with her husband, Bill. It has raised millions of dollars from foreigners in the name of charity. A Wall Street Journal analysis showed that from 1997 to 2014, Ukraine provided the most donations, with $10 million coming from billionaire oligarch Victor Pinchuk.
Another New York Times story documented a potential conflict of interest in which the Clinton Foundation received donations from Russian oligarchs interested in investing in a Kazakh uranium mine. The mine’s owner had business in the U.S., requiring State Department approval for the investment, which it received as the Clinton Foundation took money from those who would benefit from the deal.
The upshot is that Clinton’s chances of victory on Nov. 8 are looking better.
According to the latest polls, Clinton leads Trump by 9 points, getting a boost after the Democratic National Convention and growing unease with the idea of Trump as president.
