President Trump is trying to negotiate an end to the war launched by Russia against Ukraine, but his plan for peace reads more like a plan for the surrender of Ukraine to Russia, since if implemented it would allow Russia to keep the land it’s already won, and more as well. If Trump wants real peace, and not simply a Nobel Peace Prize for which he’s angling, he should scrap his current plan, transfer more armaments to Ukraine with fewer restrictions on their use, and demand that our NATO allies do more as well. Otherwise, the implementation of any plan which allows Russia to keep its ill-gotten gains may encourage Russia to resume its aggressive imperialism in the near future. He may never get his coveted Peace Prize, but he may be able to secure a safer and more durable peace anyway.
“[T]he Nobel Peace Prize is awarded for peace, not surrender.” So said CNN and Washington Post commentator Fareed Zakaria when commenting on Trump’s quest for the Nobel Prize for negotiating peace agreements around the world. And to Trump’s credit, the Abraham Accords, negotiated during his first term, and the ceasefire agreement between Hamas and Israel, which produced the remaining live hostages held by the terrorists, represent a greater record of achievement than that of President Obama, for which he was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 2009. If Obama deserved the Peace Prize, then Trump does too (and maybe President Biden as well, given he was able to also negotiate the release of Hamas-held hostages).
But Trump’s plan to end Russia’s war against Ukraine does not rise to the level of a realistic plan for a viable and lasting peace. After all, in its current form, it calls for the recognition of Ukrainian territory won by Russia as now part of Russia, and may require Ukraine to cede to Russia more territory not yet won by force of arms. Will rewarding Russia for going to war against Ukraine truly bring peace, or will it simply encourage Russia to wage more warfare against Ukraine and other European nations in the near future after taking a break from war to restore its military strength?
The question is more than rhetorical or academic. As noted in previous columns, Russian President Putin has mourned the collapse of the old Soviet Union as the greatest geopolitical catastrophe of the 20th century. And while Putin does not want to restore socialism to Russia, he does want to restore Russia’s influence in the world to the level wielded by the Soviet Union. But this can be done only with the restoration of dominance over Ukraine, other former territories of the old Soviet Union—Latvia, Lithuania, and Estonia, for example—and the Soviet Union’s Eastern European satellite states, such as Poland, Bulgaria, Romania, Hungary, and the current states once comprising Czechoslovakia. The implementation of Trump’s current plans, by rewarding Russian aggression, may well trigger future Russian aggression too. After all, it’s frequently the case that to reward a particular behavior pattern is to encourage more of the behavior being rewarded.
If Trump truly wants peace between Ukraine and Russia, and not simply a medal, a ribbon, and a cash prize, he should withdraw his plan and develop a new plan by which any peace agreement requires that Russia, at the very least, return all its ill-gotten territories to Ukraine. To encourage Russia to do so, Trump should facilitate and accelerate arms shipments to Ukraine, while eliminating any restrictions on their usage against Russian military targets on Ukrainian or Russian territory or at sea.
Moreover, Trump should return to pressuring our NATO allies to do more as well. He has already succeeded in extracting from them promises to increase their military spending in general. He, and the other NATO leaders, should exploit the overwhelming demographic and economic advantages the NATO members have over Russia. For example, the combined population of all the countries in NATO, including the United States, is over 960 million—more than 6.5 times that of Russia’s population of 146 million. And the combined gross domestic product of the NATO countries is almost $46 trillion, almost 18 times the size of Russia’s 2.6 trillion dollar economy. (Fun fact: The GDP of Texas is about $2.8 trillion).
Probably the best way to achieve a genuinely lasting peace between Ukraine and Russia is for the United States and its fellow NATO countries to supply Ukraine with enough weapons and other forms of assistance to enable Ukraine to defeat Russia so decisively that Mad Vlad Putin will abandon his quest to restore Russia to Soviet “greatness.” That approach is hardly likely to win Trump his coveted peace prize, but given how the consideration of a possible recipient’s personality plays in the selection process, Trump’s chances of winning the Nobel Peace Prize anyway are basically zero, despite his genuinely worthy accomplishments in the Middle East.
But Trump can take consolation in the fact that none of America’s Cold War presidents, from Harry Truman through George H. W. Bush, ever won a Nobel Peace prize for standing up to the Soviet Union until its collapse (Jimmy Carter’s Nobel Prize was for post-presidential work). So if Trump sends up more effectively to Russia, he at least will be in good company, and worthy of thanks for helping save all the lives that might otherwise be lost to future Russian aggression.
Malcolm L. Cross has lived in Stephenville since 1987 and taught politics and government at Tarleton for 36 years, retiring in 2023. His political and civic activities include service on the Stephenville City Council (2000-2014) and on the Erath County Republican Executive Committee (1990-2024). He was Mayor pro-tem of Stephenville from 2008 to 2014. He has served on the Board of Directors of the Stephenville
Economic Development Authority since 2018, and as chair of the Erath County Appraisal District’s Appraisal Review Board since 2015. He is also a member of the Stephenville Rotary Club, the Board of Vestry of St. Luke’s Episcopal Church, and the Executive Committee of the Boy Scouts’ Pecan Valley District. Views expressed in this column are his and do not reflect those of The Flash as a whole.
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