Trump’s Chess Gambit: Bluffing America into Checkmate

Reset 2.0

We’ll get back to talking about how to disrupt our nascent kleptocracy and the ways you can take action in your community in a couple of days, but Donald Trump wants to make this moment about Ukraine. We see the fight for Ukraine as a proxy for the fight for the rule of law. Trump wants to change America’s relationship with the rule of law, and that will have an impact everywhere, especially in Ukraine. You can’t make the rule of law a mere suggestion at home and expect the rest of the world not to feel it, too. And because of our globalized economy, that reverberates back on us, as we shall see.  

I have two more posts about Ukraine after this one. Though Ukraine is the topic, the posts are really about the US. 

Trump is Getting Rolled

Donald Trump loves to present himself as the ultimate dealmaker, master strategist, and even a chess master. He barreled into negotiations with Volodymyr Zelensky, believing he had a handful of aces in a poker game against Zelensky. He thought he could use that to get some business deals. 

Not only did he make America the sleazy used car salesman for a stale Yanukovych-era corrupt deal (as we’ll discuss tomorrow), but he misunderstood that America’s leverage is against Russia, not Ukraine. That’s why he has looked so weak in these Ukraine negotiations.   

On Truth Social, Trump displayed his trademark false confidence and unsettling habit of referring to himself in the third person: “Trump played both sides like a master chess player. In the end, Zelenskyy will have no choice but to concede because, without US support, Ukraine cannot win a prolonged war against Russia.” Ukraine has wanted a peace deal for years. And the negotiations over the vaunted mineral deal are in no different place than they were months ago when Trump’s buddies dredged it up: Ukraine remains open to talking and is, in fact, eager for deals in the sector as long as they are clean. However, Trump has managed to harm the US defense industry, one of America’s few manufacturing powerhouses. They have remained quiet instead of sticking up for democracy, truth and the rule of law, and now their customers have started to respond. 

Reset 2.0

I thought it was difficult for an American president to demonstrate more Ukrainian death-manufacturing gullibility than Barack Obama did with his naïve Russia Reset™, but Trump and his advisors have blown that out of the water with Reset 2.0.

At that time, the Obama administration misunderstood Russia's vulnerabilities and naively accepted Putin’s claims about Russian power. Trump not only buys Putin’s bluster but fails to recognize US leverage and against whom to apply it. And boy, does it show…

Zelensky already called Trump’s bluff by correcting him, and the Trump team and Moscow are about to discover that Ukraine doesn’t need the US nearly as much as they think. 

How Trump Blew This Negotiation is Pretty Amazing

In theory, the strength of Trump’s negotiating position should come from the tiny – tiny – amount of military assistance the US has actually delivered to Ukraine. The Biden administration got an infuriating pass on its abysmal follow-through on promises to Ukraine, and Trump contributed to this with insane rhetoric like this. Or this. 

Ukraine’s allies have matched the US dollar for dollar on weaponry. Yup, you read that correctly. Other countries value the rule of law and thus need Ukraine to win. Unlike Trump and, er, Biden, the raw numbers don't lie. According to an analysis by The Insider, while the US has committed billions in aid to Ukraine, much remains in the pipeline. Unfunded yet approved weapons commitments total $57 billion, with an additional $40 billion available but unspent. Official aid packages have only announced $65.9 billion in military aid, and even less—around $50 billion—has been delivered in military equipment, ammunition, and weaponry. Biden was all hat and no cattle, as the political scientists say. 

However, that means that Trump has billions of dollars already paid for and programmed that he could use to force Putin to the table without even going to Congress. Trying to bluff the Ukrainians just won’t be as effective. 

Zelensky Knew the Free World Had His Back

Zelensky must have been blown away that the President of the United States was so wildly misinformed. Zelensky knew and tried gently to explain that Ukraine’s other allies already matched Biden’s meager deliveries and, going forward, must only cover that gap, not Biden’s grand, unmet promises.

That “other allies” is important. We’re not talking just about the EU. The entire First World supports Ukraine’s fight to defend the rule of law and the liberal order. Over the past ten years of war (going back to the annexation of Ukraine in 2014), Ukraine has learned hard lessons about fickle allies and developed a broad and deep support network that appreciates the importance of the rule of law.* The Ukraine Defense Contact Group, consisting of 50 nations, coordinates assistance. Just four of them—Canada, Japan, South Korea, and the United Kingdom (none of them EU)—boast a combined GDP of $33 trillion. Replacing the $50 billion in military aid from the United States would only require a mere 0.15% of their combined economies.

To dismiss Ukraine as solely reliant on American support is not just a misunderstanding. It’s naïve.

Damage to US Industry

The one thing Trump did achieve with his bluff was to damage the US defense industry’s brand. The US business community seems to have forgotten how important the rule of law is to their businesses and has failed to stand up for it. Lockheed Martin appears to be the first casualty, and workers in Pennsylvania, Texas, and Arizona may now need to prepare for more layoffs. Germany’s Rheinmetall, Britain’s BAE Systems, and South Korea’s Hanwha are increasing production to take advantage of Trump’s gift. 

Ukraine is likely the largest consumer of HIMARS ammunition in the world right now, but it is hardly the only foreign customer. Existing and potential customers must now factor in the risk of American unreliability before investing in Lockheed Martin's cash cow. Trump may have restarted aid, but the damage has been done—to Raytheon’s Patriots or BAE Systems’ Bradleys, too.

Halting key weapons systems and intelligence may have achieved its grim goal of killing hundreds of Ukrainians, but no Ukrainian collapse followed. Maybe it still will? Yet, all those other allies stepping up to support Ukraine will also no doubt consider the risk of US unreliability before making enormous investments in weapons procurement. European defense stocks have surged; America’s have stagnated. Canada and Portugal have already stated that they’re considering ditching the F-35. And America First had already prompted allies to seek defense equipment elsewhere. How will the US afford to defend, say, Taiwan when it will cost so much more per unit to produce weapons?

Trump’s Endgame 

The easy answer is corruption. Our post tomorrow talks about how Trump wants to force Ukraine to accept a system of doing business that they have fought and died to eliminate. Witting and unwitting (but silent) American business people see dollar signs instead of a fight to defend the rule of law. 

Zelensky knew the rest of the Free World had his back when Trump rolled up to that disastrous White House meeting. Zelensky knew the US has enormous leverage over Putin because of the rule of law. And he probably came into that meeting thinking the self-proclaimed master negotiator would want to wield it against Putin to force peace. So, when Trump basically claimed that he was holding a royal flush in a poker game against Zelensky, Zelensky probably had to muster every ounce of his willpower not to embarrass Trump. Zelensky must be baffled that Trump is unaware of this or, in his formulation, that “we aren’t playing cards.”

We’ll see if the self-proclaimed chess master succeeds in forcing Ukraine to accept a shady mineral deal, but so far, he’s only succeeded in kneecapping American industry. 

PS – I’m terrible at chess, and I know I’m switching between chess and card metaphors. Still, I would be curious to learn from Gary Kasparov what other World Chess Champions call it when an opponent appears unable to see a path to victory that is staring them in the face. 

 * That’s why this anti-corruption nonprofit cares so much about Ukraine. It’s about the rule of law and anti-corruption actions' power over authoritarians. Ukraine knows it. The liberal order knows it. Trump and American businesses are about to find out.