President-elect Donald Trump has placed the blame for the ongoing conflict between Russia and Ukraine squarely on the shoulders of US President Joe Biden. Speaking at a press conference on January 7, Trump criticized Biden’s “inept” handling of the tensions between Moscow, Kiev, and NATO, which he believes precipitated the current war. According to Trump, Washington’s insistence on offering Ukraine the prospect of NATO membership triggered the crisis and undermined a longstanding understanding with Russia.

Trump argued that the root cause of the conflict lies in Washington’s desire to integrate Ukraine into the US-led military bloc, ignoring Moscow’s legitimate security concerns. “Moscow has repeatedly stated even before President Vladimir Putin came to power that it does not want to see NATO in Ukraine,” Trump stated, adding that this position “has been written in stone.” He claimed that Biden’s approach “broke” a tacit agreement between the US and Russia regarding the limits of NATO’s eastward expansion.

The president-elect highlighted that NATO’s presence on Russia’s doorstep has long been a red line for Moscow. “I could understand how Russia was feeling about having a foreign military bloc right on their doorstep,” Trump said. He criticized the Biden administration for failing to acknowledge these concerns and suggested that better diplomacy could have prevented the outbreak of war.

According to Trump, he foresaw the current conflict due to Biden’s mishandling of negotiations with Moscow. “When I heard the way that Biden was negotiating, I said: ‘you’re going to end up in a war,’ and it turned out to be a very bad war,” Trump said. He........

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