U.S. policy towards Ukraine won’t change with Trump, officials say

U.S. foreign policy will remain the same towards Ukraine even if Donald Trump is elected president, Ukrainian Foreign Minister Pavlo Klimkin told the annual Yalta European Strategy conference, held in Kyiv since the illegal annexation, on Sept. 17. Relaxing sanctions against Russia for the annexation would contradict long-term American interests, he said, as reported by the eurointegration.com.ua news site. Not only is not recognizing the Crimean annexation necessary, but also the preservation of permanent coordinating efforts, which is supporting by both U.S. parties, he said.

Addressing the same conference, former Defense Secretary Leon Panetta stressed that the U.S. checks and balances system prevents any single president from radically changing state policy. “If (Donald) Trump becomes president, he will have a large problem with fulfilling any of his promises,” Panetta said. “We are not electing a king and we’re not electing a person with the powers of a king. The judicial system, the Congress, the Senate – their opinion is important in reaching decisions in the state.”

Zenon Zawada: We certainly hope that these assessments prove correct and sanctions remain in place after Trump’s possible election. Yet there are numerous factors that could empower Trump to drop the Crimean issue, and the sanctions. They include the election of French and German heads of state next year that are more sympathetic to Russian President Putin (such as Nicolas Sarkozy), as well as swelling support for Trump among the U.S. public if he faces opposition from Congress.

Should his popularity grow, we also believe it’s possible that more politicians in the Republican Party could swing away from neoconservative foreign policy towards Trump-style nationalism in a bid to redefine the party. There’s also the factor of the Russian lobby in Washington coalescing votes to support dropped sanctions over Crimea, and possibly even Donbas.