Crimea residents prefer to be under Russian rule, Trump says

The residents of Crimea prefer to be under the Russian government, which has to be considered when evaluating the annexation of Crimea, Republican presidential contender Donald Trump said in a television interview broadcast on July 31. “I’m going to take a look at that,” said Trump, regarding the Crimean annexation. “But the people of Crimea would rather be with Russia than where they were. And you have to look at that also. And that was done under Obama’s administration.”

Trump said he wasn’t involved in the effort by his staffers to remove support for lethal defensive weapons for Ukraine from the Republican Party’s foreign policy platform and that he’d look at it. Russia is present in Ukraine “in a certain way,” Trump acknowledged, but also said that Putin “is not going to go into Ukraine” under his leadership. He also used the example of Ukraine as further evidence that NATO is obsolete. “With all these strong ties to NATO, Ukraine is a mess, Crimea has been taken,” he said. “Don’t blame Donald Trump for that. We’ll do better and we’ll have a better relationship with Russia.”

Zenon Zawada: With his remarks, Trump is laying the groundwork for allowing Russia to keep Crimea and dropping sanctions over Crimea (though not necessarily occupied Donbas). If he’s elected, it’s foreseeable that Trump will offer major concessions to Russian President Putin, such as recognizing the Crimea annexation, in exchange for assistance with invading Iraq, bombarding Islamic State positions and ultimately installing a new government to replace the Islamic State. In the interview, he stated he would seek to cooperate with Russia in eliminating the Islamic State.

Such a foreign policy implies undermining the pillars of international law, which prohibits military-led annexation and occupation of foreign territories. (It wouldn’t be the first time an international obligation wasn’t enforced. The West has also failed to uphold its promises to Ukraine under the 1994 Budapest Memorandum.) It would also legitimize and strengthen the repressive, authoritarian regime of Russian President Putin, which is responsible for a great deal of crimes committed internationally, not only in regards to terrorism but also in the financial and property rights spheres.

If there’s a silver lining to be found in such a policy, it’s that warfare could cease in Ukraine. The cost to ending the killing could be Ukraine’s independence from Russia, whether through a frozen conflict in Donbas or the establishment of de facto autonomy in Donbas. (Yet the latter policy is currently being supported by the French and German governments anyhow.) If Trump becomes president, we also don’t rule out Ukrainian President Poroshenko becoming more authoritarian and finding more compromise with Russia.