Today, Explained - Breaking up with Ukraine

Episode Date: March 4, 2025

Why the humiliation of Volodymyr Zelenskyy holds a twisted appeal for Trump's core supporters. And what Europe plans to do about it. This episode was produced by Avishay Artsy, edited by Jolie Myers, fact-checked by Laura Bullard and Kim Eggleston, engineered by Patrick Boyd and Andrea Kristinsdottir, and hosted by Sean Rameswaram. Transcript at vox.com/today-explained-podcast Support Today, Explained by becoming a Vox Member today: http://www.vox.com/members Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy preparing for the European leaders' summit on Ukraine in London. Photo by Justin Tallis - WPA Pool/Getty Images. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

It's official. The United States is breaking up with Ukraine. Last night the president suspended military aid to the country. That's about one billion in arms Ukraine isn't getting until it commits to negotiating peace with Russia. That move of course comes after a perfect meeting with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy at the Oval Office on Friday. They talked about playing cards.

You don't have the cards right now With us you start having cards Right now you don't have the cards You're playing cards You're gambling with the lives of millions of people You're gambling with World War 3 They talked about being thankful Have you said thank you once?

They took questions from the crowd What are you saying? She's asking what if Russia breaks the ceasefire. What if they, what if anything? What if a bomb drops on your head right now? Today explains looking into why humiliating Zelensky appeals to the MAGA base and what Europe plans to do about it. Warning.

I've got this condition where I don't feel pain. You're a superhero. If this is how intense Nova Kane sounds, imagine how it looks. Say more? Yeah, big time. Nova Kane, forming theaters March 14th. At Desjardins, we speak business. We speak startup funding and comprehensive game plans.

We've mastered made-to-measure growth and expansion advice. And we can talk your ear off about transferring your business when the time comes. Because at Desjardins Business, we speak the same language you do. Business. So join the more than 400,000 Canadian entrepreneurs who already count on us. And contact Desjardins today. We'd love to talk. Business.

Desjardins today. We'd love to talk business. Ukraine, Ukraine Explained. It's Ukraine Explained. Today Explained, Sean Ramos, here with Eric Levitz, a senior correspondent at Vox. Eric, I think people are pretty sure how the left and moderates and globalists responded to that Oval Office meeting between Trump and JD and Zelensky, but how did the right in the United States respond? Yeah, well, the American right responded as it responds to most things that Donald Trump

does very positively. In fact, I think it wasn't just the fact that Trump personally did this, but that substantively on the MAGA right, on the nationalist American right, there's a real appetite to see the United States stand up to Ukraine and Zelensky and project the kind of line that Trump did. So you saw the American conservative magazine hailed Trump's performance as a great clarifying moment in which a US president finally stood up to the warmongering Washington foreign policy blob. Former Trump advisor, Steve Bannon,

lauded the administration as giving a masterclass in how to deal with an entitled punk. And you sort of saw similar sentiments from other conservative influencers and social media users and Republican politicians. Now, you know with the Bannon comment, it sounds like he has some disdain for Volodymyr Zelensky, the Ukrainian president. There was a sense from what was going on in the room and from, you know, what's his name, Brian Marjorie Taylor Green, bullying Zelensky over not wearing a suit. Do you own a suit?

That people on the right maybe just don't like this president? Is that the case? So, I think they don't or a significant segment doesn't. And I think that there's really two really distinct reasons for that, depending on what part of the right you sit on. Among hardline American social conservatives, there is just outright fondness for Putin's Russia fondness for Putin's Russia that's been this presence within the movement since about 2013 when Putin enacted what he called an anti-propaganda law. Russia's Duma gave near unanimous approval to a vaguely worded bill that would ban

homosexual propaganda accessible to minors. Hundreds of people took to the streets of the Capitol on Saturday to demonstrate for and against the measure, which effectively bans gay rights rallies and could be used to prosecute anyone voicing support for homosexuals. Critics say this is just one more step in what the Russian government sees as a fight against Western values. It was also simultaneous with a broader crackdown on LGBT rights within Russia.

American social conservatives, who at the time were dealing with an Obama-era advance in gay rights and social liberalism, really took inspiration from this. And Putin, in the years after, really started casting himself as a defender of traditional Christian morality against an increasingly decadent West. And so there's a part of the American right that simply likes and supports Vladimir Putin, sees him as kind of representing God's side in this new cultural Cold War in which Ukraine is kind of the front for this decadent European pro-gay cultural movement and that Putin is essentially pushing back against this.

And so that informs their views of the Ukraine-Russia conflict and thus their views of Zelensky. How big is this faction in the United States of pro-Putin Americans? Because you know, historically speaking, Eric, Russia, Putin, bad. Yeah, so I think that this is a very marginal force on the level of the American population as a whole, I think about 8% of Americans have expressed a positive view of how Vladimir Putin handles world affairs. I think that it's overrepresented, though, an oversubscribed view among Republican elites, and, you know, particularly, I think those in the general orbit of

And, you know, particularly, I think those in the general orbit of JD Vance. Um, and so to this, you know, segment, Zelensky is, is a sinister figure who, um, maybe some of them will allow that he's doing the right thing for Ukraine because Ukraine needs America to intervene, although not all of them would say that, but they pretty much uniformly see him as fundamentally irresponsible and potentially inviting a nuclear war. Okay, so Putin not necessarily MAGA's best friend. Zelensky maybe not so much MAGA's arch nemesis, but this way of thinking that the United States needs to have Europe's back all the time, not exactly the MAGA platform. Yeah, like I said, I think it's a little bit that and then there are, you know, for the

purposes of telling a compelling narrative, I think, but also maybe it's felt, you know, figures like Joe Rogan have actually really had a strong emotional and negative reaction to Zelensky. So Rogan has implied that he's addicted to cocaine and said that, you know, Zelensky is basically trying to orchestrate World War III. Zelensky, can I get a drug test? This is like cocaine, like, baby, Putin's fucking scared, man. Putin's terrified. We got him, man. We got him. Like, what are you talking about? He has nuclear missiles, you fucking monkeys. Jesus Christ.

I think that there's a broader group of conservatives who don't have any particular ill will to Zelensky but just fundamentally oppose the goal of fighting for Ukrainian democracy. And then there are others who actually specifically have animus towards him. Notably the Russian government has also at times implied that Zelensky is addicted to cocaine, so I think that there's some specific narrative here that I'm not fully versed in, but yeah, this seems to be a meme. How do most Americans feel about all this, Eric? It sounds like Trump's base, Joe Rogan, not into supporting Zelensky and Ukraine.

But most Americans, I mean, we've been at this for years now, you would hope most Americans are on board. Yeah, I think that there is definitely mixed feelings and there is declining American support for involvement in the Ukraine war, particularly as Republicans move more against it. There's also, as CNN's Harry Enton pointed out, He's doing considerably better than Joe Biden was doing on the handling of the Russia-Ukraine

conflict. And so on this simple question, I think Americans are saying, okay, Donald Trump's doing all right on this. Well, Donald Trump at this point says he wants nothing more than peace between Russia and Ukraine, perhaps with a little bit of Ukraine resources on the side. Does this US break with Zelensky that we're seeing now get us any closer to peace? I don't think it does. I think that there is a reasonable argument that as part of a comprehensive strategy for forcing an end of the conflict,

the United States should encourage Ukraine to prepare itself for making some territorial concessions in the interest of peace. Because Russia has some advantages in a long-term war of attrition, it has a lot more people, it has a lot more people. It has a lot more resources. And so there's an argument that, you know, Ukraine should be interested in the kind of deal that Trump sometimes expresses fondness for. We want, like you, a sovereign and prosperous Ukraine. But we must start by recognizing that returning to Ukraine's pre-2014 borders is an unrealistic

objective. But an effective version of that strategy, in my view, would require the United States to credibly threaten to fund Ukraine's war effort indefinitely so that Russia actually has an incentive to come to the table. If Ukraine is going to be starting to draw down the military supplies it received from America, then six received from America, then six months from now Russia might be in a position to conquer a lot more territory than they are today.

Giving them that impression is not a recipe for a near-term peace. So what is? If I had a really good answer to that, I think that I would be potentially making more money at a different employer. I think it is a very difficult situation. I mean, on the Ukrainian side, in order to get Ukraine comfortable with signing a peace agreement, I think you really need to have some kind of assurance that its security is going to be protected if it does make concessions. I think that Zelensky is in a position where he really does not have a good choice beyond trying to win back the Trump administration's favor because the path for Ukraine to really

get decent settlement of this conflict is much narrower if the United States is not in its corner. Eric Levitz read his work at Vox.com. Ahead on Today Explained, you're up to the plate. Support for the program today comes from Better Mint. You thought I was going to say something else. Better Mint asks, do you want your money to be motivated? Do you want your money to rise and grind? Do you think your money to rise and grind? Do you think your

money should get up and work? Betterment has a lot of questions for you and for your money. Betterment is an automated investing and savings app that they say makes your money hustle. That's a fun visual. Their automated technology is built to help maximize returns, meaning when you invest with Betterment, your money can auto-adjust as you get closer to your goal, rebalance if your portfolio gets too far out of line and your dividends are automatically reinvested. And according to the company, that can increase the potential for compound returns. Visit Betterment.com to get started.

Investing involves risk. Performance is not guaranteed. Support for this show is brought to you by Noom. Weight loss isn't about getting a quick fix. It's about lasting change. That's where Noom comes in, offering a complete science-backed approach to sustainable weight loss.

By pairing GLP-1 medications with their proven behavior change program, Noom has already helped millions achieve their goals. And now it's your turn. With Noom GLP-1, you can get access to a doctor, a coach, and a supportive community all from within the Noom app on your phone. You can ask your care a doctor, a coach, and a supportive community all from within the Noom app on your phone.

You can ask your care team anything regarding your plan, and get support with medication and side-effect management. Plus, Noom GLP-1 comes with Companion, your guide to better and more sustainable GLP weight loss. Companion even comes with Muscle Defense, a program to help you keep the muscle and lose the fat. Noom GLP-1 starts at $149 and is delivered to your door in seven days. Start your GLP-1 journey today at Noom.com. That's N-O-O-M dot com.

Noom, the smart way to lose weight. Not all customers will medically qualify for prescription medications. Compounded medications are not reviewed by the FDA for safety, efficacy, or quality. Fox Creative. This is advertiser content brought to you by the all-new Nissan Murano. Okay, that email is done. Next on my to-do list, pick up dress for Friday's fundraiser. Okay, alright, where are my keys? Oh, in my pocket. Let's go. First, pick up dress, then prepare for that big presentation. Walk dog, then... okay. Inhale. One, two, three, four. Exhale. One, two, three, four. Ooh, who knew a driver's seat could give such a good massage?

Who knew a driver's seat could give such a good massage? Wow, this is so nice. Oops, that was my exit. Oh well, that's fine. I've got time. After the meeting, I gotta remember to schedule flights for our girls' trip. But that's for later. Sun on my skin, wind in my hair. I feel good.

Turn the music up. Your all new Nissan Murano is more than just a tool to get you where you're going. It's a refuge from life's hustle and bustle. It's a place to relax, to reset, and the spaces between items on your to-do lists. Oh wait, I got a message. Could you pick up wine for dinner tonight? Yep, I'm on it. I mean that's totally fine by me.

Hey Google, play Celebrity Memoir Book Club. I'm Claire Parker. And I'm Ashley Hamilton. And this is Celebrity Memoir Book Club. Today Explained is back with Shashank Joshi, defense editor at Leading Magazine, The Economist in London, England. Shashank. The United States doesn't seem to want to help anymore with this war, at least for the moment.

Who's going to help Ukraine? Well, the good news is that there's already a lot of aid flowing to Ukraine from non-American sources and then you can add into that Canada, Australia, and indeed even some other Asian countries, Japan and others. The bad news is that that 40% of American aid includes some stuff that is pretty significant. So that's things like air defence systems that can take out big Russian ballistic missiles. It includes intelligence support to help Ukraine understand what's going on, where the Russians are, how to target their missiles. And it includes some commercial services

provided by American companies. The most famous one, of course, being Starlink, the communication systems provided by Elon Musk's SpaceX. There's no indication that has stopped right now, those things, intelligence or Starlink, but there is a concern, obviously, that that could be severed at some stage. So, what does that mean for Ukraine? Does that mean they can't win this war with the US pulling out in its intelligence, air support capacity? It means Ukraine's in trouble. It doesn't mean it's in immediate trouble.

There's enough stuff in the pipeline, enough stuff in their stockpiles in order to keep going, certainly through spring, probably through the summer. There's a lot, you know, the Biden administration gave them a ton of stuff just before they, they finished their time in office. And if you look at what Ukraine's defense industry is making, we must remember here, Ukraine had this huge defense industry in Soviet times, right? It was like the specialist maker of, I think, guidance systems for Soviet ballistic missiles in the Soviet Union. So it has this incredible engineering skill. It's building out huge numbers of strike drones that are now providing the lion's share of casualties in the war. The Ukrainian government says they can make about 40% of their battlefield needs. But anyway, all in all, that's great. But if the Americans cut everything and run, war, the Ukrainian government says they can make about 40% of their battlefield needs. But anyway, all in all, that's great. But if the Americans cut everything and run, then

we would be in a battlefield crisis probably by the end of this year, maybe early next year where ammunition would be running dry, the Russian Air Force would be able to go over Ukraine more easily. And you just answer your question directly, no, Ukraine would not be able to win. It would have to stay on the defensive. It would be eking out its position, probably falling back. And I think it would be in a very, very difficult place at that point. I mean, if we game that out, does that mean that ultimately in about a year, once their

resources run dry, and they're forced to capitulate potentially that they may end up in the same place they're in right now with President Trump trying to force them to come to a negotiating table and to settle this thing? Well, at that stage, I suspect President Trump would have less interest in the war. He would have had to wash his hands of it at that point. But I also caution, you know, war is unpredictable. In early 2022, I was among the many people who thought that Ukraine was bound for defeat against these overwhelming odds. And I completely, you know, hold my hands up and acknowledge

I was wrong because wars are unpredictable. Things happen. We saw a rebellion in Moscow with one of Vladimir Putin's most important mercenaries, Evgeny Prokofiev, rising up and marching on the Capitol. So who knows what happens in a year? The Russian economy could blow up. We could see other developments inside Russia. You know, in some ways, the strategy on the Ukrainian side has been, look, keep it going, keep the Russians engaged, keep killing or wounding 1200, 1300 Russians a day, and something will turn up. At some point, they will just run out, they'll get exhausted. And so I'm always wary of saying Ukraine will lose because we don't know all the other things that can happen in a conflict like this.

And technologies change as well. The drone revolution that Ukraine is exploiting right now to inflict these massive casualty rates, those ton of drones, they did not exist as usable battlefield weapons back in February 2022. Europe seems to be making noise about stepping up in this moment. There was this huge assembly of European leaders and Justin Trudeau this past weekend. The UK is prepared to back this with boots on the ground and planes in the air together with others. Europe must do the heavy listing.

Is there going to be a difference between the European support of say, you know, four or six months ago and what we see in the coming months? I think there is. Yes. I think I think we realize we're in a crisis here. And I know we've said that before. You may have heard that before in Trump 1. You may have heard it before at other times. But this feels to me the most febrile, fluid moment in European security in my lifetime, and possibly

since, you know, I think certainly since the end of the Cold War, possibly the most dramatic rupture in transatlantic relations, maybe since the 1950s. And I can see people finding new ways to spend more on defense. You can have a big 150 billion euro loan facility for European defense programs. You could allow the EU's own budget to go on defense, get a European investment bank to put money into it. So I'm seeing all these new solutions to say at the end of the day, whether it's for Ukraine, whether it's for us, if you walk away, if America walks away from NATO, we need more money.

And I am seeing radical new ways to consider that that I haven't seen in the past. Why was it that the US was so invested in Ukraine up until say, I don't know, last Friday? I think fundamentally the same reason it's been invested in Europe since 1945. It realized that a continent in which this authoritarian power is able to steamroller over a smaller power, change borders by force, that this begins to threaten NATO. And if you threaten NATO, you begin to threaten the basis of European security, the cohesion and peace and economic prosperity of Europe that America has benefited from by trading with Europe for so many years. But I think the

larger picture is also that if you're in a world where a dictator can basically rewrite the borders by force and say, actually, this country doesn't exist, I'm going to take it that this doesn't bode well for everyone else. This doesn't bode well for Taiwan. It doesn't bode well if you're kind of Japan or South Korea. It doesn't bode well if you're kind of a Japan or South Korea. It doesn't bode well if you're any American ally. And in turning that upside down, I'm seeing concern, profound concern, not just among Europeans. You know, you can accuse us of being whiny Europeans, and sometimes we are. But actually, I'm seeing a lot of concern among Taiwanese, among Japanese, among Australians

who are looking at this and thinking, hey, this administration that is saying, I will no longer defend you and in fact, I want you to give me $500 billion worth of minerals to pay me back. They're saying, what would this administration do if my country came under attack and would they do anything or would they turn on me and demand I hand over my resources in a kind of protection racket? I think that's provoking some serious questions about the reliability and integrity and the good faith of the United States government as we have known it for 80 years. But hearing you say that Shashank, it occurs to me that, you know, we're talking about

our own president who, you know, isn't quite at that dictator status, but is making threats, you know, north of the border in Canada, over there in Greenland, south of the border in Panama. I mean, this is a guy who's into territorial conquest. What do you think the U.S. might lose in a moment like this, where it seems to be transitioning to this sort of more America first mindset. I think that's a brilliant question.

And my goodness, where do we begin, right? Look at Germany. The US has a lot of troops in Germany. Do we think they're all there just to sit there defending Germany against Putin? No, Germany is this huge hub for American military power projection. It has this huge military hospital.

It's an air bridge to get your forces to the Middle East. And then what about this coalition to compete with China in technology? Do you think you're gonna do this whilst the Europeans are hoovering up Chinese electric vehicles and building Huawei into their telephone systems? It's an alliance, a tech alliance

in which alliances are critical. You need to work with partners. That's been the assumption of this last administration, the Biden administration, but even Trump won to some degree. If that's going away and allies are just viewed as these inferior powers who have to come to the Oval Office in a suit and pay tribute and grovel, then I think America's gonna find itself in a suit and pay tribute and grovel, then I think

America's going to find itself in a world where stuff it has taken for granted, that allies just show up in Iraq and Afghanistan to fight alongside you, for instance, that that world is going to crumble and America will be on its own. And one of the big strengths it has that China doesn't and that Russia doesn't, which is real allies, that will ebb away. Hmm. So America first saves us some money. Maybe, you know, I don't even think I'm trying to play the devil's advocate. All I can think is that it saves us some money. No, look, I mean, let me have a go, right? Because I think it is important to understand where an administration like this is coming from. I think there is a faction in the administration that says, Europe is a side story. We're going

to get out of Europe and send stuff to Asia, husband our resources. We're not going to spend 50 billion a year on Ukraine. We're going to spend it on Asia, confront China, put more stuff into Japan, put more stuff into South Korea. I think that that kind of makes sense. I may not agree with that, but I see the internal logic of that. However, however, it is a big but. This assumes this is a normal administration that does strategy where people, you and I sit in a room and discuss strategy and produce documents. What happens when the president puts out a video saying, you know that strategy you said about pivoting to Asia? I just want to put this AI video out showing you a giant golden statue of myself in Gaza because I want to own Gaza. And then at that point, there is no sense of strategy. It's a sense

of whimsy. It's a kind of, you know, the emperor Caligula making his horse the consul. It's a sense of governance by presidential impulse. And there I think I'm afraid I can't offer a coherent view of strategy other than a raw assertion of American power, regardless of the costs or consequences or benefits. Shashank Joshi, Economist.com. Avishai Artsy produced, that's a hat trick. Devin Schwartz was producing too. Patrick Boyd and Andrea Christensdottir mixed.

Jolie Myers edited. And Laura Bullard and Kim Eggleston fact checked. Thank you Kim. I'm Sean Ramos for him. I'm gonna be at South by Southwest in Austin, Texas this Saturday. Come say hi if you're there, too I know I told you I'd be talking to Rami Youssef, but Tim Wall said he wanted to chat So we're doing that instead swing by the Vox Media podcast stage

presented by Smartsheet and Intuit if You're into it learn more at Vox Media dot-com slash S X S W Vox Mediaia.com slash S-X-S-W, voxmedia.com slash South by Southwest. All right, all right, all right. Music