War Not Peace
Trump's dodges are driving Moscow's escalation
(Konstiantynivka in Ukraine’s Donetsk oblast, November 28th, 2025 [Reuters])
On the first page of 1984, George Orwell’s masterpiece, we learn the elevators are not working in Victory Mansions, where protagonist Winston Smith has a flat. “It was part of the economy drive in preparation for Hate Week,” Orwell writes.
Every week is Hate Week in today’s fascist Russia. Ever since Ukraine regained its independence in 1991, it has been Russia’s preferred target for state-sponsored rancour. In a deeper sense, Moscow’s hatred of Kyiv’s autonomy and identity goes all the way back to the first Russian-Ukrainian wars in the mid-17thcentury.
Russian proxies channel this hate. In Donald Trump’s second term, we’ve witnessed the sickening spectacle of the United States endorsing, at the highest level, Moscow’s never-ending drumbeat of incitation. Let’s recall the story so far.
The Trump Administration has cut off almost all US military support for Ukraine. Trump and Vance publicly berated and tried to humiliate Zelenskyy in the Oval Office. They rolled out the red carpet for ‘Putin’ — an indicted war criminal – in Alaska. They pressed Ukraine to surrender its territory. They want to limit the size of Ukraine’s armed forces. They seek to block further NATO enlargement and allied deployments to Ukraine. They have lifted some sanctions on Russia and advocated EU lifting of others. They want fascist Russian back in the G8.
Trump’s antics are a smorgasbord of cowardice and betrayal. Yet the 28 points, featuring most of Russia’s wish list, are improbably portrayed as an effort to end the conflict. To call support for a genocidal aggressor a ‘peace plan’ is itself Orwellian.
Everything Trump has done this year has amplified Russia’s perennial Hate Week against Ukraine. By hyping a ‘peace initiative,’ he has distracted credulous allies, delayed new sanctions, slowed weapons deliveries to Ukraine, and disoriented Kyiv’s wartime government. His scheme was a dodge from the start.
In the meantime, the Kremlin has used Trump’s obstruction of allied help for Ukraine as its cue to prepare for more war. ‘Putin’ is now openly calling for the elimination of any trace of Ukrainian identity from occupied areas. Moscow is mobilizing for a larger war. The Russian army continues to bomb Ukrainian cities, wreck Ukraine’s grid and inch forward, with zero regard for life, into parts of Ukraine’s Donetsk oblast it does not already occupy. Trump’s new ‘National Security Strategy’, which seeks to weaken NATO and the EU, is aligned with Moscow’s interests. The Kremlin is preparing to hand power over to the son of its top war-mongering Chekist. Trump’s circle is sizing up real estate and energy deals carefully dangled by Moscow, while angling to tap confiscated assets previously earmarked for Ukraine’s use.
In Orwell’s novel, published in 1949 as the Cold War opened, totalitarian Oceania engages in Hate Week to shore up support for Big Brother. Autocratic Eurasia and Eastasia do the same. The Party manipulates history to turn people against unseen enemies and each other. These mega-states are perpetually primed for war.
By joining Moscow’s Hate Week, Trump is setting the stage for more war. His pretend diplomacy needs to be called out for what it is – a dangerous charade. Allies should recommit to basic principles of territorial integrity, freely-chosen alliances and international law, as Zelenskyy has done in Europe this week.
Allies need to move quickly past the paralysis Trump’s year-long Hate Week has induced. Far from submitting to Trump’s heavy-handed Kremlin propaganda, Americans still want to see the US deliver more military support for Ukraine and tougher sanctions against Russia.
While our elevators are still working, we need to ensure Russia’s do not. The Kremlin war machine won’t stop until it’s starved of resources and defeated on the battlefield. Allies should embargo Russian oil and gas fully, once and for all. They should offer Ukraine, at long last, unlimited military support. They should back a shared campaign to strike Russia’s military infrastructure and protect all of Ukrainian airspace. Most of all, they must commit to defeating Russia in Ukraine and deterring Russian aggression elsewhere. Allies need to put aside propaganda and proxy pantomimes to call Big Brother’s bluff. They need to finish the job.