TBH at the break neck speed that everything has been happening up here it is pretty hard to write about one topic given welp I have freaking work hahaha. That being said people have talked about this so.... lets talk about it.
Last Friday as I sat at an AI lunch briefing all of a suddenly my personal phone just blew up... What was the cause of this? Well I think everyone knows by now but it was the press conference that was going on between President Trump and Ukrainian President Zelenskyy. Being up in DC for the whole Biden Admin and now the Trump Admin I have a lot of thoughts about what all I saw and it covers both pros and cons of what transpired.
That being said lets get after this.
First things first this was Zelenskyy's first true interaction with Trump over anything meaningful. Prior stuff had been through either intermediaries or in situations were there really were not any stakes. In all honestly I have to think that Zelenskyy was not prepped to deal with someone like Trump. After all its known Trump is a narcissist and you have to stoke his ego I mean look at the President of France?!?! He and Trump after tons of back and forth randomly got along really really well suddenly. For years Zelenskyy has dealt with Biden who ya know... there wasnt much and so it was a culture shock for Zelenskyy to say the least.
To appease Trump could Zelenskyy have put on a suit? Sure but has he even when Johnson invited him to speak before Congress? No not at all nor when he has been in front of the UN or anyone else for that matter. Unless some wire was sent saying Trump expected it not gunna lie why would Zelenskyy suddenly change? The same could be said for John Fetterman who Trump has come to love at this point lol.
Trump and Vance's actions though... they were far from ideal and given the stress and strain that Zelenskyy is under it was a little wild to see the US President and the VP to act the way they did. At the end of the day the US needs those minerals and they do not have a ton of options when it comes to rapidly acquiring them. If they think Russia is going to share them and not be forced by China to give them to China then Trump and Vance are ignorant something I do not think that they are with this.
Not to mention the US and Europe have been increasing manufacturing of these munitions and guess who those jobs are going to.... the Republican electorate. It is an easy thing to do to boost manufacturing in the US and keep the money in the US. Sure the munitions might go to Ukraine but we dont have boots on the ground and by showing how superior the US munitions are will help us with India and Saudi. Plus we get to see how our stuff handles a drone warfare environment something that is the future of warfare. All at the cost of not a single American life.
Trump let his ego take over though and at least for now has just pissed off everyone. Even the defense contractors are going to be mad and I mean that is not the easiest thing to pull off. Poland and many other European countries are going to pivot from looking at us to purchase munitions to rapidly building out what they need to produce there own and that is a huge miss for the US. While I would like to say that Trump will save face tomorrow that does not seem to be the case.
It was just announced he has paused all military aid to Ukraine even the stuff the tax payers already paid for. With the idea of Doge the fact he is freezing this aid and causing a logistical nightmare for the military and cost the US only more money is a stupid move for the Dems to hop on rub in his face. I could go on and one about this but at the end of the day while Zelenskyy might have pushed it to far Ukraine makes enough drones to keep the Russians at bay for a while. Hell they have even been advancing in some areas in the Donbass.
This went from an easy win to an embarrassment ego moment and it is frustrating to say the least.