Trump’s appeasement of Putin is a betrayal of Ukraine and European allies

MUNICH — On Thursday, I stood for long frozen moments in the icy rain outside a handsome gray stone building, looking up over a pillared portico and at a row of arched windows.

The building housed Adolf Hitler’s Munich offices in the 1930s. Behind those windows, in Hitler’s private study, British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain negotiated the notorious Munich Agreement, in which the führer was allowed to bite off a chunk of Czechoslovakia. Accepting that aggression was supposed to end Germany’s passion for land grabs, supposedly to feed the needs of the German people.

That deal, which came to be called the “great betrayal,” was done without any Czech participation in negotiations. Chamberlain claimed it would bring “peace in our time.” Instead, it was the precursor to World War II. The prime minister’s name has been forever linked with the appeasement of despots, even though he genuinely, if foolishly, thought he was saving Europe.

On Tuesday, President Donald Trump did Chamberlain one better, betraying Ukraine to Russia’s Vladimir Putin in one shameful phone call. I think history will be far unkinder in its description of the U.S. president’s appeasement because he is so totally indifferent to the fate of Europe and Ukraine.

Staring up at that window, I wished I had some magic to save Ukraine, Europe, and the United States from the foreign policy disasters Trump is so eager to commit.

I came to Germany to attend the Munich Security Conference, an annual gathering of top U.S. and European officials who are set to discuss the need to stand up to Putin and enable Ukraine to achieve a just and secure peace. There was even talk that Trump’s special emissary for Ukraine, retired Gen. Keith Kellogg, might unveil a peace plan at the conference.

Just before I arrived, there was a terrorist attack quite near my hotel by a young Afghan asylum-seeker who plowed a car into a union demonstration, wounding dozens. That will undoubtedly feed into Sunday’s German elections, where the Alternative für Deutschland party has risen to second place in the polls. Elon Musk has called the far-right party the only one that “can save the country,” which gives a good idea of his politics.

But inside the huge, elegant Hotel Bayerischer Hof, the focus of the MSC2025, as the security conference is known, was set to be on how to help Ukraine (and on artificial intelligence and new military technology).

Instead of Kellogg, the administration has sent Vice President JD “I don’t really care what happens to Ukraine one way or another” Vance — presumably to tell President Volodymyr Zelensky, also in attendance, that the game is over. As many expected, Kellogg’s mission appears mainly to have been window dressing until Trump had time to call Putin.

Trump has flat-out accepted the Kremlin’s dismemberment of Ukraine, without a word of criticism of Putin. He made clear it is now up to the Europeans to provide economic and military aid to Ukraine with minimum U.S. assistance (even though the Europeans have been giving far more aid to Kyiv than we have).

Yet, everyone knows they don’t have the bandwidth to do this alone, since the U.S. has military capacities they are lacking. Nor can they provide security guarantees for Kyiv that Putin won’t violate any “peace” he and Trump agree to, even if, as seems likely, Trump grants all of Putin’s wishes.

What is so staggering to watch is how Trump handed Putin practically everything he sought before negotiations even started, mouthing Russian talking points about Kyiv — and got zero in return from the Russians. The hostage exchange of Mark Vogel was just another gift to the Kremlin, which seizes Americans to get Russian criminals out of Western jails.

Moreover, with his indifference to — and ignorance of — history, Trump seems impervious to the huge hit he delivered to U.S. and European security through his fervent embrace of Putin at the expense of Ukraine. Despite his facile claims he wants to “stop the killing,” Trump shows no animosity to the Kremlin’s war crimes. Nor does he show any interest in defending democracies that used to be considered our key friends.

So why is Trump so interested in appeasement? Just look at his Truth Social post shortly after Putin’s call and you see the answer: ego.

“We each talked about the strengths of our respective Nations, and the great benefit that we will someday have in working together,” Trump wrote. “But first, as we both agreed, we want to stop the millions of deaths in the War with Russia/Ukraine.” Note Trump never mentions those deaths were caused by Putin’s unprovoked invasion, and that he seems sublimely ignorant of how Putin has continued for years to flatter him — an effective strategy now recognized by other world leaders.

“We agreed to work together, very closely, including visiting each other’s Nations,” Trump went on. “We have also agreed to have our respective teams start negotiations immediately and we will begin by calling President Zelensky of Ukraine, to inform him of the conversation.” In other words, letting Ukraine know Trump agrees with Putin, that Kyiv is an afterthought, and that the permanent dismemberment of Ukraine isn’t worth discussing with Zelensky beforehand.

Shades of Chamberlain, indeed.

What comes through so clearly in Trump’s exuberance (and Putin’s post-phone call praise of Trump’s intelligence) is that the U.S. president wants to get credit for a peace deal even if it kills Ukraine. At which point, of course, he will blame that death on President Joe Biden.

What is so shocking is that a U.S. leader would so eagerly and quickly sell out to a Russian dictator who has his number. Trump seems determined to throw out so-called deals like confetti at a Super Bowl parade. Never mind the pain caused or the likelihood of failure.

This is the same kind of fecklessness he has displayed with his proposed Gaza deal. Does he really think Israelis can march two million Palestinians into new refugee camps and this will not destabilize the whole region? That it would not end the Jordanian and Egyptian peace treaties with Israel and make one with Saudi Arabia impossible?

And by wrecking the U.S. Defense and State Departments, gutting America’s intelligence-gathering capacities, and leaving our country open to Chinese and Russian adversaries, does Trump really think he is showing strength? If he does, it is he who is suffering from Trump derangement syndrome because he has come to believe he is an infallible god.

So let me return to those windows into Hitler’s Munich office. Like Hitler, Putin recognizes a patsy when he sees one, and will play Trump for all he is worth.

Ukrainians are fighting for their very existence against a dictator who has pledged to destroy them. I look forward to hearing Zelensky speak at the conference, as well as all the European leaders who will try to make Trump listen — probably to little advantage. They, too, will be very conscious of this city’s history.

If Trump betrays them, as looks likely, he will be more than a criminal. He will be a weakling interested only in his own glory, something Putin and China’s Xi Jinping will recognize and use to their advantage.

Perhaps Chamberlain will soon relinquish the mantle of the great appeaser.