LOS ANGELES.–Ukraine’s 47-year-old President Volodymyr Zelensky said Ukraine’s power plants “belong to the people of Ukraine,” and are not for sale or use as a bargaining chip in future peace talks. Yet 72-year-old Russian President Vladimir Putin took control of the Zaporizhzia nuclear power plant, the largest in Europe. Putin has shown no interest in returning the Zaporizhzia power plant to Ukraine in any future peace deal. Speaking with 78-year-old President Donald Trump March 19, Zelensky rejected the idea of the U.S. owning or managing the plant to assure the “best protection” for Ukraine’s infrastructure. Zelensky said he wouldn’t discuss the U.S. or EU taking over the Zaporizhzia power plan or any other power plant in Ukraine to offset any security assurances to Ukraine. “We will not discuss it. We have 15 nuclear power plants in operation today. This belongs to our state,” Zelensky said.
Trump has grown frustrated with Zelensky culminating in a Feb. 28 shouting match in the Oval Office where Trump asked Zelenksy to leave the White House. Zelensky never really apologized for the blow up, other that writing on X that the incidents was “regrettable,” not admitting that he lost his cool. Zelensky thinks that he can capitalize on enough EU antipathy toward Trump that he can get the EU to foot the bill for continuing the Ukraine War. While Zelensky says he wants peace, he has certain unrealistic demands he expects to meet in any long-term peace deal with the Kremlin. Trump said he “moved beyond” a rare earth mineral deal Zelensky was suppose to sign in the Oval Office Feb. 28, instead realized that it doesn’t move Zelensky any closer to a peace deal. Zelensky wants Putin to pay war reparations to a battered Ukraine after three years of war.
Zelensky doesn’t like the fact that Trump has moved in his conversations with Putin to reset normal U.S.-Russian relations. Zelensky can’t understand how the U.S. can be allies to Ukraine when it seeks normal relations with its mortal enemy? Before the U.S. had any relation with Ukraine it was involved in global diplomacy and arms control with Russia for decades. Once Biden decided to fund proxy war in Ukraine with the Kremlin, Putin saw the war as one between the U.S. and NATO against the Kremlin. “Anything is possible with the Americans,” Zelensky said sarcastically, criticizing Trump for reestablishing normal diplomatic relations with Moscow. Zelensky was far more comfortable with Biden’s approach of essentially breaking off normal diplomatic relations with Moscow. Going to war with the Kremlin sacrificed U.S. foreign policy and national security.
Zelensky is hung up with Ukraine’s sovereignty knowing that going to war with the Kremlin was risky. Trump told Zelensky that it was a mistake to go to war with the Kremlin, knowing the amount of sovereign land he’s lost over the last three years. Zelensky wants everything back in peace talks but that’s not how war it works. To the victor, goes the vanquished, in the rules of war, where Zelensky rolled the dice with Ukraine’s sovereignty and got burned. Peace now involves a cessation of hostilities but doesn’t involve getting back sovereign territory lost in three years of war. “Anything is possible with the Americans, but this is something quite unusual,” said an unnamed Ukrainian official when it comes to the U.S. owning the Zaporizhzia nuclear power plant. Ukraine no longer possesses the Zaporizhzia plant because it’s in Russia’s control.
Zelensky has helped turn the EU against Trump, largely because they back his fight with the Kremlin, where Trump seeks a peace deal. Trump doesn’t see the war with Ukraine as winnable, leaving Ukraine battered and losing sovereign territory daily. Zelensky complains that Putin continues his attacks on Ukraine’s energy infrastructure after agreeing in principle to beginning a ceasefire at some point. “Yesterday evening, another Russian strike hit our energy infrastructure,” Zelensky said, showing how Putin could not be trusted. “Despite Putin’s words about allegedly being ready to stop attack—nothing has changed,” Zelensky said. But Putin has not yet agreed to any pause in the three-year-old conflict because he sees no signs the Ukraine or the EU has changed in basic approach to the conflict. Putin sees Zelensky and the EU as hostile to the Russian Federation.
EU officials say, “There was a shared view that no real negotiations are taking place at the moment. Leaders also exchanged about the best ways to have an influence on the process,” knowing that the EU are out of loop when it comes to Trump’s conversations with Putin. Kremlin officials say they like what they’ve seen between Trump and Putin, especially with both leaders seeking to improve U.S.-Russian relations. Unlike Trump, EU officials have taken Zelensky’s side, believing that Putin must make more concessions to bring about peace. U.K. Prime Minister Keir Starmer said he was putting together a “coalition of the willing,” ready to back Ukraine in its fight for sovereignty against the Kremlin. EU officials can’t reach any agreeement about post-war security for Ukraine, knowing that Putin could veto the idea of having EU troops in Ukraine.
About the Author
John M. Curtis write politically neutral commentary analyzing spin in national and global news. He’s editor of OnlineColumnist.com and author of Dodging The Bullet and Operation Charisma.
