On the evening of August 30, Donald Trump made a new statement about Zelensky and Putin and a possible trilateral meeting. The US President also spoke ambiguously about the war in Ukraine.
Points of attention
- Donald Trump accuses Ukraine and Russia of being unwilling to end the war, equating their conflict to children fighting on a playground.
- The US President hints at a possible trilateral meeting with the presidents of Ukraine and Russia, but expresses skepticism about the willingness of the parties to resolve the conflict.
- Trump's analogy of children on a playground sheds light on his perspective of the ongoing war in Ukraine and his belief that sometimes conflicts need to escalate before resolving.
Trump again called Russia and Ukraine "kids fighting on the playground"
In response to journalists' questions about whether trilateral talks between Trump, Zelensky, and Putin will take place, the US president said this:
There will be trilateral ones. I don't know if there will be bilateral ones (bilateral ones — ed.), but there will be a triad.
However, in the very next sentence, Trump accused Ukraine and Russia of being "not ready" to end the war.
I'll use an analogy that I've used a few times. You have a kid, and there's another kid on the playground, and they hate each other, and they start swinging and swinging and swinging. You want them to stop, but they keep swinging. After a while, they're very happy to stop. Do you understand that? Sometimes they have to fight a little bit before you can get them to stop. But it's been going on for a long time. A lot of people have died.
Donald Trump
President of the United States
Thus, Trump once again equated the victim of aggression with the aggressor.
Trump also once again rejected the deployment of US troops to Ukraine.
