WASHINGTON — Since U.S. President Donald Trump took office in January last year, diplomatic circles in Washington have raised the prospect that Ukraine could become the casualty of a "second Yalta." At the Yalta Conference, held in the final stage of World War II in the southern Ukrainian resort city of Yalta, the great powers of the day — the United States, Britain and the Soviet Union — decided the future of Germany and Eastern Europe and the shape of the postwar world order without the participation of the countries concerned. The expectation was that Trump, who has consistently acknowledged the power of states such as China and Russia, could again bypass Ukraine and discuss an end to the war with Beijing and Moscow.
Those signs have grown clearer in recent days. Meeting reporters at the White House on the 20th, Trump said Russia is a big country while Ukraine is not, adding that the United States has provided enormous sums to Ukraine and has received nothing in return but higher diesel prices. He said it is time for Ukraine to agree to end the war. Washington is also applying physical pressure by suspending support for Kyiv. Trump has effectively halted supplies of Patriot missiles, which are essential to Ukraine's air defense. Intelligence sharing that gives early warning of Russian air attacks is no longer functioning properly, and access to Starlink was at one point restricted, crippling Ukraine's drone operations.
There are also concrete signs of movement toward talks among the three powers. Asked a day earlier about the possibility of a U.S.-China-Russia summit on the sidelines of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation forum, Trump said he would be willing to do so. The APEC summit will be held in Shenzhen, China, on the 18th and 19th of next month. Trump has invited Russian President Vladimir Putin and Chinese President Xi Jinping to the Group of 20 summit in Miami in December.
The New York Times said that if a three-way summit comes together, it would bring together the leaders of the world's three largest nuclear powers, and that it could create an impression similar to the Yalta Conference. Just as Yalta involved the major powers recognizing one another's interests, the paper noted, a meeting of the three leaders could lead to a "regionalization of the world" in which each confirms its influence over its own sphere.
From the early days of Trump's term, diplomats had also suggested that the president, a former New York real estate developer, had shown a "mafia"-like inclination to divide territory among the strong, and that he could behave the same way in carving up the world order. The idea was that the United States, China and Russia would each exercise influence in their own spheres and recognize one another's sway. Trump has indeed moved to strengthen U.S. influence in the Western Hemisphere, expanding his push on Greenland and capturing former Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro.
Concern is also mounting in Europe. The U.S. online outlet Politico reported that the prospect of an unprecedented three-way summit with Putin and Xi — for decades America's most powerful rivals and direct adversaries — is sending shock waves across Europe, and that diplomats say they do not even want to imagine what Trump might agree to. The concern is that Trump could strike a deal unfavorable to the West at such a meeting.
As worries about being sidelined grew, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy insisted that Ukraine must take part if three-way talks on ending the war are held. At a news conference in Oslo, Norway, Zelenskyy said he does not know what a U.S.-China-Russia meeting would cover and that this is up to them, but stressed that if Ukraine and its future are discussed, he can accept it only if Ukraine is at the negotiating table.
Zelenskyy met U.S. presidential envoy Steve Witkoff in Oslo, and Witkoff is to travel to St. Petersburg, Russia, for talks with Russian officials on ways to end the war. Russian officials said they hope a meeting between the U.S. delegation and Putin can take place as early as the 21st.
