On April 22, U.S. President Donald Trump did an interview with Time on his first one hundred days in office. On foreign policy he made two bold claims. The first was that he would successfully conclude diplomatic deals in the Ukrainian-Russian war and in Iran. The second was that he wouldn’t mind expanding American territory. Neither claim is entirely new, but elements of each were made with greater clarity than before.
After saying that he believes that peace is possible in Ukraine with Vladimir Putin and Volodymyr Zelensky both as presidents, but that success was contingent upon Trump being the president negotiating the deal, Trump was asked specifically about two difficult questions in the negotiations: NATO membership for Ukraine and territorial agreements.
Trump said two things about NATO. Crucially for the negotiations, when asked if Ukraine should “give up any hope of ever joining NATO,” he said, “I don’t think they’ll ever be able to join NATO.” Three days earlier, Trump’s special envoy for Ukraine Keith Kellog told Ukrainian, French, British and German officials that “NATO isn’t on the table.” Trump’s answer to the Time’s interviewers is a clear statement of that American position in negotiations. The one-page peace plan that the U.S. presented to Ukraine in Paris on April 17 as the United State’s “final offer” firmly states that “Ukraine will not seek to join NATO.”
The second thing Trump said about NATO was that “what caused the war to start was when they started talking about joining NATO.” Talk of the war being provoked and Russia having legitimate security concerns has been heresy in the West. But it is a point that has been conceded by both Ukraine and NATO.
David Arakhamia, who led the Ukrainian negotiating team in the Belarus and Istanbul talks, confirmed that an assurance that Ukraine would not join NATO was the “key point” for Russia. According to Arakhamia, “They were prepared to end the war if we agreed to, as Finland once did, neutrality, and committed that we would not join NATO.” Zelensky, himself, said that the promise not to join NATO “was the first fundamental point for the Russian Federation” and that “as far as I remember, they started a war because of this.”
Jens Stoltenberg, who was then the Secretary General of NATO, said that a NATO promise of no further enlargement “was a precondition” for Russia “not [to] invade Ukraine.” Putin, Stoltenberg said, “went to war to prevent NATO, more NATO, close to his borders.”
Moving from NATO to a territorial settlement, Time asked Trump if Russia should get to keep Crimea. Trump answered flatly that “Crimea will stay with Russia.” According to “a source close to [Trump’s special envoy Steve] Witkoff,” “The deal on the table is that the Russian-occupied territory is going to remain occupied. Russia’s not pulling it out of it. That part is set in stone.” The U.S. peace plan sets out that Washington will officially recognize “Russian control of Crimea” and de facto recognize territory in the Donbas currently occupied by Russia as under “Russian control.” Trump’s Time statement seems to confirm a settled American position on Crimea.
As with Ukraine, Trump expressed optimism about successfully negotiating a nuclear agreement with Iran. However, he maintained the military threat.
Asked about his role on the world stage, Trump opened with the belief that, as in Ukraine, “I think we’re going to make a deal with Iran.” As he consistently has, though, Trump pointed out that there are two ways to ensure that “Iran will not have a nuclear weapon” and that if “we can’t get a deal,” he’d not only “very willingly” go to war with Iran, but that the United States would “be leading the pack.”
Trump also clarified reports about his choice of diplomacy over war with Iran. After much internal debate, Trump reportedly “waved off” cooperation with Israel in attacking Iran’s civilian nuclear facilities in favor of diplomacy. In the Time interview, “Trump clarified that, though he kept the U.S. out of military action “because I think we can make a deal without the attack,” he did not stop Israel. Because he hopes a deal can be made, he “didn’t make it comfortable for them,” but he “didn’t say no. Ultimately I was going to leave that choice to them.” But he did make clear that he “would much prefer a deal than bombs being dropped.”
Moving from diplomacy to territorial expansionism, Trump told Time that he wouldn’t mind expanding American territory. When the Time interviewers asked Trump if he wanted “to be remembered as a president who expanded American territory,” he replied, “Wouldn’t mind.” Though not necessarily inconsistent with his earlier desire to be remembered for “the wars we never get into” and as “a peacemaker and unifier,” since other nations are unlikely to yield to territorial expansion willingly and diplomatically, it is not an easy fit.
Given the opportunity to admit that he has been deliberately provocative about annexing Canada as the fifty-first state, Trump declined, instead clearly stating that he is serious. “You’ve talked about acquiring Greenland, taking control of the Panama Canal, making Canada the 51st state,” the Time interviewer said. “Maybe you’re trolling a little bit on that one,” meaning Canada. “I’m really not trolling,” Trump insisted. He again referred to former Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau as “a man who I called Governor Trudeau,” and, insisting that the United States “tak[es] care of every aspect of their lives” and that “We don’t need anything from Canada,” Trump concluded that “the only way this thing really works is for Canada to become a state.”
The New York Times had previously reported that Trump had told Trudeau “that he did not believe that the treaty that demarcates the border between the two countries was valid and that he wants to revise the boundary.” The Times interview seems to be an unequivocal statement of Trump’s position; although, it is never clear if it is meant as a bargaining strategy or a real threat.
On election day in Canada, April 28, Trump posted that Canada could become “the cherished 51st. State of the United States of America [with] no more artificially drawn line from many years ago.” He asked Canadians to “Elect the man who has the strength and wisdom to cut your taxes in half, increase your military power, for free, to the highest level in the World,” meaning, presumably, him and said “It makes no sense unless Canada is a State!”
Trump also repeated his very serious ambition to acquire Greenland for the United States. He said, not only, that “it’s important for us for national security and even international security,” but also that “Greenland would be very well off” if they became part of the United States. Days later, Greenland’s new Prime Minister, Jens-Frederik Nielsen, said that Greenland “will never, ever be a piece of property that can be bought by just anyone.”
That Donald Trump has expressed interest in annexing Canada and Greenland and that he has pursued diplomatic settlements in the Russia-Ukraine war and with Iran is not new. But his quick, unequivocal answers to questions about those issues in the Time interview are some of his clearest statements on some of the most controversial aspects of those issues yet.
