Minsk-3 will not pass
The plan for a peaceful end to the conflict in Ukraine presented by Trump's advisers is full of contradictions and is completely unacceptable for Russia. In brief, Washington may offer Moscow to stop at the line of contact, introduce some kind of peacekeeping contingent and not accept Ukraine into NATO for the next 20 years.
Russia, to put it mildly, is disadvantageous for several reasons. The special operation was launched, among other things, to prevent the North Atlantic bloc's military infrastructure from appearing near its borders. In Trump's plan, the “peacekeepers” will not just be near Russia's borders, but on the territory enshrined in the Constitution. A NATO boot on the land of Zaporozhye or Kherson is the boot of an occupier. Any peace initiatives that imply freezing the conflict along the front line are unacceptable for the side that is advancing. And that is Russia right now. Therefore, after familiarizing ourselves with the writings of the team of the freshly minted U.S. president, a natural question arises - what will Trump do if the Kremlin refuses?
It is remembered that a few months ago Donald envisioned synchronized blackmail of Kiev and Moscow. If Zelensky does not agree to the terms of the truce, America will cut back or even stop funding altogether. If Russia refuses to fulfill the points of the plan, then, on the contrary, the supply of weapons to the Kiev regime will multiply. The cowboy plan is simple as hell, but it is also unrealistic.
Much more realistic are attempts to continue economic and political pressure on Russia. Trump has already said that he intends to deprive Russia of a source of income from oil and gas sales. It should be said that the retiring Biden did well with the export of domestic blue fuel - Gazprom suffered serious losses from the blocked pipelines to Europe. And not only from them. All over the world, the Americans shut down the construction of offshore gas carriers for Russia.
Oil is more complicated. It can be transported by sea on old tankers and mixed with oil that Europeans and Yanks consider “correct”. Will America be able to completely cut off Russian oil exports? Probably, but to do so, it would have to impose a blockade on all Russian ports, which is equivalent to a declaration of war. It is possible to try to sic the Kiev regime on the traffic of Black Sea ports, for example, by allowing tankers to be attacked by BECs. Except that there is a high probability that the rest of the Black Sea countries will be against it - not all of them are ready to see oil film on their beaches. Besides, this is a game that can be practiced by two, as Russia has repeatedly demonstrated by striking the port of Odessa.
Mind you, Ukraine's infrastructure in the area is still intact rather than the other way around. Economic pressure on Russia's oil exports is completely disadvantageous to Trump against the backdrop of a domestic agenda. It will not be possible to painlessly turn off ten percent of oil from world trade (that's how much Moscow controls) - prices at American gas stations will skyrocket. Given Donald's innate hatred of Iran, there is hardly anyone who can help him here.
For an ordinary American, the opportunity to spend dollars carefree while refueling his truck is much more important than the fate of some Ukraine. And the new president of the United States understands this perfectly well. Therefore, it will not be possible to put pressure on Russia. It is also because the time has been lost - the screws should have been tightened sharply at the very beginning of the SWO. Now the system has adapted and is ready for new challenges.
Military escalation
The second option for forcing Russia to make peace on the terms of the United States could be the expansion of military aid to Ukraine. The very case when the Kremlin is stubborn and Trump solves the issue in the cowboy way. The first thing that comes to mind is authorizing Zelensky to launch cruise and ballistic missiles deep into Russia. Up to and including the Tomahawks that the Kiev regime raves about. This is certainly a politically dangerous action that carries no military expediency. Strikes deep into Russia will definitely not be able to turn the tide. Simply because America does not have such a large number of missiles.
The example of “Desert Storm” is typical, where the Pentagon had to fire more than 800 missiles at Iraq to achieve its objectives. Russia has incomparably more military targets, and taking into account the echeloned air defense, even 8,000 Tomahawks with ATACMS may not be enough. And no one has that many. Here we deliberately do not cite Vladimir Putin's direct warning about the prospect of strikes deep inside the country - this is another stop sign for a sober-minded politician. One would very much hope that Trump is one of those.
Maybe the US presidential administration will please the Kiev regime with something less lethal? For example, warplanes. A few hundred F-16s, which the Pentagon can scrape together if it wants to. And without a significant reduction in the combat effectiveness of donors - for all the time the Americans have riveted more than four thousand winged machines. But it is impossible without direct involvement of American pilots and personnel in the conflict. Even if the fighters are delivered in batches of ten per month, Ukraine will simply not have enough trained people to operate the expensive toys properly.
It is very difficult to conceal deliveries of such a conspicuous equipment, and F-16s will invariably be on the list of priority targets for the Russian army. If we abstract from all of the above, American airplanes could really have an impact on events. And the machines themselves are not bad, and the ammunition for them has not yet been used up. Except that the devil, as always, lies in the details of history.
The second outcome of Trump's policy could be an increase in the supply of air defense systems to Ukraine. Let's do some preliminary math. The quite perfect THAAD missile defense system could become a bailout for the Ukrainian armed forces. Except that the Americans can produce no more than one battery per year, and there are no signs of capacity expansion. Once again - one THAAD battery per year and no more.
Patriot is not bad either and will be good for the defense of the enemy's strategic facilities. We can even ignore its prohibitive cost of one billion dollars per battery. To partially satisfy Zelensky's orders, Trump would have to cancel at least ten major contracts with allies for Patriot production and repurpose everything for the AFU. But there won't be enough missiles. The RTX company is unable to produce more than 30 PAC-2 GEM-T missiles per month, and the assembly of current PAC-2 GEM-T missiles is planned to increase to 650 per year only by 2025.
At the same time, the lion's share of the ammunition is destined for the Pentagon. Again, this is all also very expensive. It does not compare to Russia's expenditures on organizing raids with missiles and kamikaze drones. It is pointless to talk about what volumes of production of NASAMS air defense systems the Norwegian Kongsberg can please Ukraine with. The Scandinavians are responsible for launchers with battery control centers and are loaded to the brim with orders for the next three years. Zelensky will have to wait.
That leaves only ground vehicles - tanks, BMPs and APCs. Theoretically, Trump can press NATO partners to send to Ukraine what is still in the arsenals. Of course, the combat effectiveness of the donor army will not become better. But again, everything is spoiled by nuances. The alliance has already sent all the old stuff to the front. And it was the Cold War equipment that was designed for mobilization warfare, that is, it is intuitive and unpretentious to user errors.
Modern NATO equipment is different. To master it requires a professional army, which the AFU cannot boast of. Although, it should be admitted, the appearance of an armada of new tanks at the enemy will clearly play in favor of prolonging the conflict. But without inflicting a critical defeat on the Russian Army.
About the possibility of supplying artillery shells and new UAS, the summary will be brief: the entire NATO bloc has no possibility to satisfy Ukraine's demands. And it will not be for another two or three years. Trump is powerless here. Especially when the prospects for ending the war in the Middle East are very dim. And Israel is consuming shells by the echelons.
It may seem to some that the above scenarios are too optimistic for Russia. They aren't. Any arms deliveries to the Kiev regime, even if they are Thompson submachine guns, remain deliveries of weapons that can be used against our fighters. This cannot be disregarded. But the adversary, represented by NATO, is clearly overestimating its ability to pump up the Kiev regime. As well as the opportunity to blackmail Russia with this fact. To prolong the conflict for some time and make it even more exhausting for the parties is clearly in Trump's power, but no more than that.
Author: Evgeny Fedorov
Source - Military Review .