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What do you think will be going through the heads of those European leaders in the Oval Office today and Zelensky himself
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What do you think their objectives will be for the end of the day
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Hi, Lewis. Good to speak to you. Yes, I liked your summary of the war so far, by the way
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The one only thing you missed out was the fact that Putin's main priority in all this is to stay in power himself
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and to prevent democracy in Ukraine from sweeping into Russia. But let's leave that aside for a moment
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Yes, I think this is really an important day for the future of Ukraine
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We have this catastrophic summit in Anchorage, in Alaska. As you summarised just now, Putin turning up with extreme demands
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and then making them even more extreme. And then President Trump, for reasons which aren't clear
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simply swallowing the lot, including giving up the rest of the Donetsk oblast that Russia hasn't
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been able to conquer in nine years of fighting. That's an area, by the way, that's not yet been
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conquered, about five times the size of Greater London. So quite a big area. This wasn't negotiation
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this was rolling over. And now the one piece of good news that we have is that the Europeans
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including Sir Keir Starmer, are arriving in force in Washington to back up President Zelensky in his
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talks with President Trump today. Now, why are they doing it? For all the reasons you've been
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talking about. The principle that you can't change borders by force is fundamental to all of our
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security. And it's baffling that Trump doesn't see that, that if we are to live in a new world where
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Russia has won this war and is ready to attack Ukraine again, but might also attack Kazakhstan or
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Moldova or the Baltic states, or other countries are encouraged to think they can invade their
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neighbours and steal their land. We're going to be in a whole new dangerous world, which will
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require massive more defence spending. We'll have a world where every country wants to acquire
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nuclear weapons because otherwise they can be invaded by their nuclear armed neighbour as Russia has invaded Ukraine So that is their top priority for the Europeans arriving in Washington today
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to emphasise this principle that international borders can't be changed by force
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As the Estonian Foreign Minister said the other day, if borders can be changed by force, none of us are safe
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Some have cited a couple of previous conflicts that might provide a model for this war
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The Winter War might be one, the war between the USSR and Finland, which did involve Finland giving up about 11% of its land in exchange for peace
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And there are some comparisons there because, again, in the 40s, no one thought the Finns would be able to fight off the USSR
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They did, albeit eventually with the loss of that land. Or indeed the Korean War, where everybody sort of accepts a de facto border, even though we're one du jour, doesn't really exist
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Do you think that those models can provide an end or at least a cessation to this conflict
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And if they were to do so, what would have to happen to make sure that Russia didn't come back for a second bite of the cherry
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It's a really important distinction to be made here between recognising de jure that any square inch of Ukraine is under Russian sovereignty
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which would set a disastrous precedent for our security across the world
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and recognising that they are de facto under control of Russia. That is to say Russia is physically in charge of them
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but we don't recognise Russian sovereignty over that land. And that's a really good precedent and that is what happened, for example
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with the Baltic states which were invaded first by Nazi Germany and then by the Soviet Union
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and for 50 years the UK and the US did not recognise the Baltic states as part of the
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Soviet Union and then eventually in 1990 they regained their independence. So if it were a
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question of saying well we accept that this land is occupied by Russia for the time being
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that might well be a way forward towards reaching a peace agreement but if the US or any other serious
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country were to recognize Russian sovereignty over any part of Ukraine, that would be another
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kettle of fish altogether and much more dangerous for all of us. Isn it truly that what Putin did in Alaska was to present a list of demands for Trump that he was completely aware He knew that Zelensky couldn accept that European countries couldn accept
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And therefore, all it was really about was the management, which is basically what Ukraine and Russia have been doing for the last three or four months
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the management of Donald Trump's perceptions, i.e. who is the bloc, the impediment to the resolution of the war
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and potentially to my Nobel Peace Prize. And Putin was again, I mean, maybe Zelensky will be successful
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in kind of handing the baton back, but he was successful in basically convincing Trump once again
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that it wasn't him. It is extraordinary, isn't it, that President Trump consistently is so pro-Russian
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that he blames Ukraine for this war starting, that he voted, he had the US vote alongside Russia
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and North Korea and Belarus and such countries in February against a resolution condemning Russian aggression
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And now we see him apparently siding with Ukraine, with Russia yet again
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One of the very interesting questions that we may see addressed today
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is this rabbit that Steve Witkoff, Trump's all-purpose envoy, pulled out of the hat yesterday when he suddenly said
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that the Russians had agreed to the US providing what he called Article 5-like protection for a
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peace deal in Ukraine. Now, of course, you can't have Article 5 protection unless you're a member
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of NATO, which Russia seems unlikely to accept. And this idea of the US providing security
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guarantees to Ukraine is potentially very important. But we need to tease out exactly
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what it means, because up to now, President Trump has been saying ensuring any future
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deal is nothing to do with the US. It's up to the Europeans to do this
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So firstly, the idea that Trump would actually offer to guarantee a peace deal. And secondly
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the idea that the Russians allegedly have agreed to this, the Russians haven't actually
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commented since Witkoff said that yesterday is extremely important And I think the Europeans will be wanting to hear more about that Well just finally what role I mean Starmer going today We initially briefed over the course of the weekend he wouldn be going but clearly there was a change of decision that they decided to all go en masse
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Extraordinary meeting. These things normally, you know, planned for months, if not years in advance
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This is all happening on the hoof, sort of de facto, kind of impromptu summit
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What role do you think Starmer can and should play in this
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He has managed to, perhaps against the odds, strike up some sort of personal relationship with Trump
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Trump hasn't, despite what many predicted, chosen to sort of attack him or to mock him or anything like that
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There's clearly some relationship there, perhaps better than most European leaders. What role, if any, do you think Britain can and should play in all this
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I think it's great that Keir Starmer is going to Washington today alongside other European leaders
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It's interesting to yse the team that they are sending there. nearly all of them are people who have a record of getting on well with Donald Trump
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We've got Merz of Germany, Macron of France, Starmer from the UK
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They're like the big three, if you like. Plus, we have Giorgio Maloney of Italy, who's got on well with Trump in the past
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A guy called Alexander Stubb, the Prime Minister of Finland. Again, quite a renowned Trump whisperer
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and then Mark Rutter of NATO, who has been roundly criticised for smarming up to Trump too much
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Daddy. Calling him daddy. Daddy, yeah, daddy. But as we saw in Anchorage, you can't smarm up to Trump too much
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We saw President Putin, a master Trump whisperer, actually saying, delivering a Trump line
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which was that if Trump had been in power when Russia first invaded Ukraine, the war would never
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have happened. So I think that they will be trying to reel Trump back in from presenting maximalist
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Russian positions as a US position and of blaming Ukraine if they don't agree to a completely
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unacceptable peace settlement. So they will be exploring those two things. First of all
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what happens to borders and land, and secondly, very important, what to make of these apparent
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US proposals for guaranteeing a future peace deal, and whether Russia has really agreed to those
