What happens if Putin doesn’t play ball?
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Welcome to The World in 10. In an increasingly uncertain world, this is The Times' daily podcast dedicated to global security. Today with me, Stuart Willey and Alex Dibble. Ukraine's president says he supports American attempts to end the war as soon as possible.

and a day after accepting the idea of a 30-day ceasefire, he's ready to sign the minerals deal as well. With that, the US has resumed intelligence sharing with Ukraine, as well as weapons supplies. It's being hailed as a breakthrough in the push for peace, but as Secretary of State Marco Rubio says, the ball is now in Russia's court. Our guest today is the political analyst and founder of EA Worldview, Professor Scott Lucas.

Scott, what are the chances that Vladimir Putin will reject this ceasefire proposal? And could that shake what seems to be Trump's admiration for the Russian president? Well, that's a huge question, Stuart. But to answer that, you have to go to multiple levels because you're not just talking about Trump, you're talking about the Trump administration. And by that, I mean that Vladimir Putin and we're almost certain the Russians are sending out the signals that they will not accept this ceasefire deal.

They have not officially said that yet, but they've put it out to Russian media that they think this is unacceptable. But when Putin tells specifically the envoy, Donald Trump's envoy, Steve Witkoff, this probably on Friday in Moscow, he'll couch it in terms which are very flattering to Trump.

Trump, of course, is the man who can bring peace. He's the man who is a great leader. And he will couch it in terms where Russia, where he says, we're not rejecting peace. Russia's not rejecting this. We just don't think this is the way forward for the settlement. And Putin has done this with Trump for years. Perhaps the most notable incident is that soon after Trump became president in 2017, he

Putin, on the sidelines of a G20 meeting in Germany, pulled him aside and talked to him for a half hour with no officials present, only interpreters. And he gave him like this whole lesson on why Ukraine is really Russian territory. And even though he's not going to be doing this directly to Trump, he's going to be doing it to Witkopf, he's going to put out those lines.

Scott, what would be the response if this ceasefire deal is indeed rejected? Could Donald Trump come away feeling slighted by that? What Putin will always dangle at the end of this is the photo opportunity. Trump will always, he'll get this meeting he's always wanted with Putin and it'll be a celebration, etc. So Trump's had this thing for Putin for long, right? But it's not just Trump, it's Trump administration officials. What did we have all of a sudden in Saudi Arabia this week?

is that you had American officials going directly with Ukrainian officials. We're talking about the National Security Advisor, Mike Waltz, Secretary of State Marco Rubio. And when the Ukrainians could get them in that meeting room one-on-one, then you could get the pragmatic approach to this. You know, the Ukrainians have had proposals on the table for a resolution of this since November 2022. It's a myth that they haven't been willing to negotiate this.

And Trump could have had this ceasefire agreement as soon as he took office on January 20th. But because of Trump playing politics, certain other advisors play politics. You had this kabuki theater for several weeks. Then you get the officials, the adults in the room. They talk to the Ukrainians. Now, what happens when Putin makes his play and rejects the ceasefire? How do those Trump officials respond to that? Do they tell Trump that the Russians are trying to play him or trying to manipulate him?

Do they say, oh, no, it's too risky. We need to play to Trump's ego. So if Trump comes out with a tweet and says, I don't like the deal, we have to revise it. Do they follow that? And that's the uncertainty. When you can get American officials who are not playing to Trump's ego and who are not scared of what Trump might do to them, then you get some measure of diplomacy to deal with this Russian invasion.

When you've got Trump officials who feel that he's watching them or that he could take retribution on him, then they have to rein themselves in or even support him as they did when he and J.D. Vance had that beatdown of Vladimir Zelensky, which, remember, was only 12 days ago. That's how quickly these things moved. Scott, could Donald Trump do what he threatened before his reelection, which was to put all the might of the U.S. behind Ukraine so they win the war?

Well, again, let's talk specifically in terms of who's going to Moscow, if it turns out to be Steve Witkoff, because that has another layer of uncertainty here. Steve Witkoff is just a buddy of Trump, you know, a buddy who is a real estate developer. You know, Witkoff does not have a background in diplomacy, doesn't have a background in power politics. He was named, remember, Trump's envoy to the Middle East, not to Russia. Why is Witkoff there? Because when the Russians were trying to play Trump,

a few weeks ago to get Trump to swing towards them and away from Ukraine, they released an American teacher who had been sentenced to 14 years there. It was Witkoff who went to Moscow and

to be part of the arrangements of that release. So the Kremlin were playing Witkoff at that point. Now, do they try to play Witkoff at this point? It's different than if it's Marco Rubio, the Secretary of State, who's there, or Mike Waltz, the National Security Advisor. So there's that area. But let's say that the Kremlin flat out send Witkoff home with nothing, absolutely nothing. Trump, I don't think, goes all in for Ukraine.

because of two reasons. One is I think Trump will still want to leave the door open, that Putin will still want him back. But secondly, Trump has based a lot of what he's talking about on this. Sorry, three reasons. I'll add the third. I just thought of the third. Second reason, Trump's got the myth that he's the guy that can end the conflict. Now, it is a myth, and we need to emphasize it's a myth. But that means he's not going to give full aid to Ukraine, for example, for attacks on Russia.

I don't think he'll step up the sanctions on Russia either, although that could happen. The third reason why I don't think Trump gives a lot of support to Ukraine is he associates support of Ukraine with the Biden administration. And of course, anything the Biden administration does is going to be despicable and awful and terrible, as we saw when J.D. Vance launched that attack on Vladimir Zelensky. So no, I think what happens here is

is that if Russia does not play to Trump, doesn't give them a way out, it's not that Trump responds by going all out in back of Ukraine, but it gives those advisors more space who are saying, we have restored intelligence sharing with Ukraine. Let's make sure that that happens. We have restored military aid to Ukraine. Let's make sure that aid gets there. And

OK, Ukraine is going to carry out attacks on Russian installations in Russian occupied territory and inside Russia. We're OK with that. European nations are furiously discussing what a peacekeeping force could look like to give Ukraine the security guarantees that it wants in the event of a ceasefire. How will those European nations be looking at this proposal that's been agreed between the U.S. and Ukraine?

Okay, well, this is where the rubber hits the road, because you can connect what the Ukraine and U.S. have done with the European proposal with Russia's reaction. First of all, the Ukraine-U.S. proposal, although it's between those two delegations, was worked out with the Europeans before the Ukrainians went to Saudi Arabia. You can go back a couple weeks ago before things went pear-shaped, which is Emmanuel Macron's visit to the White House, Keir Starmer in the White House, Zelensky. What the Europeans were working out with Ukraine was a security guarantee.

European forces, British and French, possibly other countries in the western part of Ukraine to guard installations, including drone manufacturing plants, to guard energy infrastructure, and to bolster air defenses. The Americans were needed not to put troops in Ukraine, but the Americans were needed for air cover for those troops so the Russians don't take a pop at them. That was jeopardized by the bust up between Trump and Zelenskyy.

Now Ukraine and the U.S. have a working deal for a ceasefire. If the Russians do not agree to the ceasefire, then the space opens up where the Ukrainians and the Europeans go to the Americans and say, give us that guarantee, which is those airplanes based in Poland and in Romania to protect people if we put them into the west of the country.

Up to this point, the Trump administration has been putting this really ridiculous myth out that somehow if you've got guys who go out and almost like with picks and axes dig out rare earth minerals, they are the security guarantee. They're not, right? So the Kremlin here is going to have to play this not only in terms of how they are playing off versus the Americans. They've got to do this in terms of playing off versus the Europeans as well.

Because what they had succeeded in doing was splitting the Trump people away from the Europeans. Now the possibility that we do have a genuine partnership, again, between Trump's adults in the room and the Europeans, that has been revived.

Scott, thank you. Scott Lucas is Professor of US and International Politics and the founder of EA Worldview. Yesterday, we analysed how a sea and air ceasefire could affect the war. We did record before the US and Ukraine announced that they'd agreed a plan for a full ceasefire, so we didn't go into the land element. But Justin Bronk, who is Senior Research Fellow for Air Power and Technology in the Military Sciences team at RUSI,

He explained clearly the sea and air aspect, so we very much recommend giving that a listen. That is it from us. Thank you for taking 10 minutes to stay on top of the world with the help of the times. We'll see you tomorrow.

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