The former American president endorsed France deploying its soldiers to Ukraine
Former President Donald Trump said that Ukraine’s membership in the NATO alliance was a major provocation for Moscow and part of the reason Russian President Vladimir Putin ordered the invasion of the country. Trump’s remarks were echoed by Nigel Farage, a right-wing populist in the UK.
In an interview on the All-In Podcast, Trump said he was willing to take NATO expansion to Ukraine off the table. “For 20 years, I heard that NATO, if Ukraine goes into NATO, It’s a real problem for Russia. I’ve heard that for a long time, and I think that’s really why this war started,” he said. Trump argued that President Biden provoked the war by pledging Ukraine would join NATO.
Trump additionally expressed that the war in Ukraine would not have happened under his administration because he would have kept oil prices lower, and Putin has relied on high energy costs to fuel his war machine.
Nigel Farage, leader of the populist Reform UK party, expressed a similar view of the war in an interview with BBC. “I stood up in the European parliament in 2014 and I said: ‘There will be a war in Ukraine.’ Why did I say that?” he explained. “It was obvious to me that the ever-eastward expansion of NATO and the European Union was giving this man a reason… to say: ‘They’re coming for us again,’ and to go to war.”
Farage added, “We provoked this war. Of course, it’s [Putin’s] fault, he’s used what we’ve done as an excuse.” His Reform UK party could potentially lead the opposition against a Labor government after July’s election.
However, Trump, who is often labeled a critic of the war in Ukraine, did endorse escalations by America’s European partners. When answering a host’s question, the former president pledged not to put American soldiers in Ukraine but went on to say it was a different issue for France and Germany, whom he said should be more involved in the conflict.
“It’s different for France. You know they’re neighbors, more or less we have an ocean in between [the US and Ukraine.] It’s different for Germany, although Germany’s much less involved than they should be.” Trump continued, “One of the things I think is so unfair. I think it’s terrible that we’re giving probably we’re at least a hundred billion dollars more than Europe.”
For several weeks, French President Emmanuel Macron has been working with Kiev on a plan that will see French troops as well as forces from other NATO countries deployed to Ukraine to train Ukrainian soldiers. Russia has warned the troops will become targets.
