As Trump’s Deadline For A Ukraine Peace Deal Draws Close, Here’s What To Watch
Not long after he gave Russia 10 days to stop the war in Ukraine, US President Donald Trump said unequivocally on July 31 that the United States will “put sanctions” on Moscow over its lack of movement toward a cease-fire or peace deal with Kyiv.At the same time, he said it was unclear whether financial punishments would push Russian President Vladimir Putin toward a truce and told reporters his special envoy, Steve Witkoff, would travel to Moscow after a trip to Israel, where he arrived on August 1.If Trump imposes sanctions on Russia before or after the 10-day deadline he announced earlier this week passes on August 8, it will be the first time he has penalized the Kremlin in the more six months since he took office in January following campaign promises to swiftly broker an end to the biggest war in Europe since 1945.The threat of new sanctions comes as Russia pushes forward on the battlefield and pounds Ukrainian cities with air strikes such as a missile and drone attack that killed at least 31 people, five of whom were children, in Kyiv this week – relentless attacks that Trump called “disgusting” in his remarks on July 31.Could it lead to a turning point in the war? Here’s what to watch.Will Witkoff Make A Difference?While Trump suggested that the imposition of sanctions is now unavoidable, dispatching Witkoff, who has met with Putin multiple times since January, could be a last-ditch effort to make the Kremlin budge ahead of the deadline.But the chances of that seem slim, and Secretary of State Marco Rubio said that unannounced talks this week with “some of Putin’s top people” had brought no progress on “arriving at some understanding on a path forward that would lead to peace.”Three rounds of direct talks in Istanbul in May and June also left Russia and Ukraine miles apart on key hurdles to any cease-fire or comprehensive peace agreement."Russia will not make any further concessions,” Prague-based political commentator Ivan Preobrazhensky told Current Time on August 1.“The Kremlin realized that Trump has figured out he’s being led on. As a result, Moscow is essentially preparing for a rupture in relations -- going back to the format that existed about six months ago under Joe Biden."The flipside: Putin could see Witkoff’s visit as a chance to convince the White House to back down on the sanctions threat or reverse its current course and return to laying a large chunk of the blame for the lack of progress toward peace on Kyiv, as Trump had been doing until recent weeks, when he began showing increasing frustration with Russia.While Trump has directed his ire at Moscow lately, he has also stressed that it takes two sides to make a deal and that Ukraine must do “what they have to do” to end the war. "Both Russia and Ukraine must negotiate a cease-fire and durable peace. It is time to make a deal,” John Kelley, the acting US representative to the UN, said on July 31.So, even though Ukraine has agreed to a cease-fire proposed by Trump and Russia has not, Moscow may see an opening for a bid to get Washington to press Kyiv for concessions.What Sanctions – And Will They Work?Trump has not said exactly what sanctions he plans to impose, but he has made clear they could include “very severe tariffs” on Russia itself and, as he said on July 28, “maybe…secondary tariffs” on countries that trade with Moscow.The former would probably have little impact, analysts say, because the volume of US-Russian trade is small. Secondary tariffs could be far more significant, particularly when it comes to oil and gas, Russia’s most lucrative exports. In an interview with Fox News Radio, Rubio noted that oil exports bring in “a huge part” of Russia’s revenue.But there are risks: China, India, and Turkey are by far the biggest buyers of Russian crude oil, and they are also among the top customers for its oil products, so secondary tariffs could complicate relations with all three.Meanwhile, the rewards are uncertain, with the Kremlin showing no signs of moving toward making any concessions and China seemingly unwilling to abandon its support for Russia’s war on Ukraine.Rubio said that Trump has “a lot of options,” including secondary sanctions on sales of Russian oil and “sectoral banking sanctions that would also be very powerful.” But in his own remarks on July 31, Trump seemed to play down the chances that punitive measures could sway Putin.“I don’t know that sanctions bother him,” he said.Will Trump Lean In Or Walk Away?Sanctions aside, a crucial question is whether Trump will continue to show an interest in ending Russia’s war against Ukraine in the coming months, or will he walk away, as he and other administration officials have repeatedly suggested he might.At some point, Trump will have to decide “how much to continue to engage in an effort to do cease-fires if one of the two sides is not interested in one,” Rubio said, adding that “obviously the president’s not going to wait forever.”Even before his election last November, Trump had hinted he might use a combination of sanctions on Russia and support for Kyiv, mainly in the form of weapons supplies, to push the countries toward a peace deal.On the question of arms for Kyiv, it’s unclear how far Trump is willing to go. On July 14, when he set a 50-day deadline for peace -- which he reduced this week to 10 days -- he also announced plans to bolster Ukraine’s arsenal, but not through direct deliveries.Instead, he described an arrangement in which NATO members would send existing weapons like Patriot missile systems to Ukraine and backfill them by buying new ones from the United States – or simply buy US weapons and ship them to Kyiv.But there are questions about how many weapons will get to Ukraine this way in the near future, and how quickly they will get there.Meanwhile, Trump has not authorized new arms deliveries to Ukraine under a program, frequently used by his predecessor Joe Biden, that gives the president the power to send weapons from existing stockpiles. When Trump took office, there was about $4 billion available under the Presidential Drawdown Authority (PDA).What Will Happen On The Battlefield?Ukrainian forces have made few gains on the battlefield since a major counteroffensive fizzled in 2023. Russia has been taking additional territory ever since -- albeit slowly and a huge cost in terms of casualties.When Trump announced the 50-day deadline on July 14, critics warned that it would give Russia more time to push further forward before facing sanctions or other measures, weakening Kyiv’s position in any talks over territory.The much shorter deadline mitigates those concerns, and analysts said that in any case, Russia does not have the capacity to take the entirety of what it baselessly claims as its own - the mainland regions of Donetsk, Luhansk, Zaporizhzhya, and Kherson, in addition to Crimea -- anytime soon. So far, though, Russia has shown no sign of letting up in its efforts to advance on the ground, and there is no indication that the July 8 deadline – or the sanctions likely to ensue – will change that.AFP on August 1, citing its own research, said Russia launched more drones at Ukraine in July than in any month since it launched its 2022 invasion.The same day, Putin projected confidence, saying Moscow's goal for the war remain unchanged while asserting that Russian forces are moving forward along the entire front line despite what he described as the West’s desire to stop their advance.“In the coming months, Russia will increase pressure on Ukraine and will, of course, attempt a new offensive before the cold sets in,” Preobrazhensky told Current Time, the Russian-language TV and digital network run by RFE/RL.(Current Time contributed to this report)
