Donald Trump’s concessions on Ukraine have played into the hands of Vladimir Putin, experts have warned, at a time when intelligence chiefs say Moscow is preparing its military for a major war in Europe.
US defence chief Pete Hegseth told European counterparts on Wednesday that Ukraine’s dream of returning to its pre-2014 borders was an ‘illusionary goal’ and that Kyiv’s wish for NATO membership was ‘not realistic’.
His statements are widely seen as a major victory for Putin and a devastating blow to Kyiv, which as a result could be forced to cede vast swathes of territory without the prospect of a security guarantee.
‘I tell you they’re drinking vodka straight out of the bottle in the Kremlin tonight,’ Trump’s former national security adviser John Bolton told CNN. ‘It was a great day for Moscow.’
Analysts have warned that appeasing Putin could result in history repeating itself, with former Swedish Prime Minister Carl Bildt accusing Trump of an historical sell-out of Ukraine.
‘It’s certainly an innovative approach to a negotiation to make very major concessions even before they have started,’ he said. ‘Not even Chamberlain went that low in 1938. That Munich ended very bad anyhow.’
Bildt is among a number of experts who have drawn comparisons between Trump’s statements and British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain’s ‘peace for our time’ declaration.
The Allies’ concessions to Adolf Hitler, which included the annexation of territory, came a year before Hitler invaded Poland, triggering World War II.
The deal was known as the Munich Agreement – and now discussions over the fate of Ukraine are set to be held at a security conference in the German city on Friday.
Servicemen of the 44th Separate Mechanised Brigade of the Armed Forces of Ukraine fire a Leopard 1A5 tank during a training, amid Russia’s attack on Ukraine, February 5, 2025
Your browser does not support iframes.
Pete Hegseth (R) has insisted that Trump’s peace plan was ‘certainly not a betrayal’ of Ukraine
Experts who have drawn comparisons between Trump’s statements and British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain’s ‘peace for our time’ declaration
Your browser does not support iframes.
It comes as a report from Denmark’s intelligence service (FE) published yesterday warned that if the war in Ukraine ends or is frozen, Moscow could redirect significant military resources, posing a direct threat to NATO.
‘[This] is consistent with ISW’s assessments about Russian efforts to restructure and prepare its military and society for a future conflict with NATO in the medium to long-term,’ the ISW think tank wrote on X.
‘Let’s not forget, Russia remains a threat well beyond Ukraine,’ UK Defence Secretary John Healey said this morning, adding that the UK and its allies ‘want to see a durable peace and no return to conflict and aggression.’
German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock warned that ‘peace in Europe is at stake’ in the talks, adding that it was paramount that Kyiv was involved in them.
The Kremlin today declared that it not only wanted negotiations on Ukraine with the US, but also on European security and the ‘concerns’ of Moscow, which in 2021 demanded that NATO roll back to its 1997 borders.
‘Certainly, all issues related to security on the European continent, especially in those aspects that concern our country, the Russian Federation, should be discussed comprehensively, and we expect that to be the case,’ Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters.
The Kremlin Press Secretary went on to say that a face-to-face meeting between Trump and Putin needed to be organised ‘promptly’.
‘There is definitely a need to organise such a meeting quite promptly, the heads of state have a lot to talk about,’ Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said.
Trump said Wednesday he expected to meet Putin in Saudi Arabia.
As fears grow over Putin’s expansionist ambitions in Europe and plans for Ukraine, former defence secretary Ben Wallace told Times Radio today: ‘I don’t trust Putin an inch.
He went on: ‘Without any form of mechanism or indeed guarantees, he’ll be back. He will rearm and he will be back.
‘His stated aim is that Ukraine doesn’t really exist. He believes it’s part of greater Russia. So he will be back.’
Hegseth hit back at criticism of Washington’s position, insisting today that Trump’s peace plan was ‘certainly not a betrayal’ of Ukraine.
‘There is no betrayal there. There is a recognition that the whole world and the United States is invested and interested in peace, a negotiated peace, as President Trump has said, stopping the killing. And so that will require both sides recognising things they don’t want to,’ said Hegseth.
UK Defence Secretary John Healey said this morning that Russia ‘remains a threat beyond Ukraine’
Speaking to reporters in the Oval Office yesterday, Trump said: ‘I think President Putin wants peace and President Zelensky wants peace and I want peace.’
Describing his call with Putin, Trump said: ‘People didn’t really know what President Putin’s thoughts were. But I think I can say with great confidence, he wants to see it ended also, so that’s good – and we’re going to work toward getting it ended and as fast as possible.’
He added that they had agreed to ‘work together very closely, including visiting each other’s Nations’ and to ‘have our respective teams start negotiations immediately.’
He added that the pair would ‘probably’ meet in person in the near term, suggesting that a meeting could take place in Saudi Arabia.
Kyiv-based journalist and charity worker Paul Niland responded to Trump’s comments that Putin is seeking peace by saying: ‘Anyone who thinks Putin wants peace overlooks his history of warring.
‘Nothing in his record indicates that he has ever wanted peace. You’re also missing the brainwashed population hooked on war. And you’re missing the fact that the Russian economy is based on war now.’
Danish conservative MP Rasmus Jarlov also criticised the President on X, writing: ‘Trump is the first president to surrender to America’s arch enemy. Russia.’
Defence analyst and historian Paul Beaver has also warned issued a warning about appeasing Putin, telling the Sun: ‘Trump wants a Nobel Peace Prize but all he is doing is signalling weakness.
‘Ukraine has had many bad days and this is worse than others because their greatest ally appears to have sold them out.
‘Putin will be celebrating the success of his aggression. I fear history is repeating itself with potentially terrifying consequences,’ he said.
Servicemen of artillery crew of the special unit National Police fire a D-30 howitzer towards Russian troops at a position in a front line, amid Russia’s attack on Ukraine, in Zaporizhzhia region, Ukraine January 11, 2025
Damaged buildings in Orikhiv, Zaporizhzhia region, Eastern Ukraine, February 12 2025
Some experts fear that a US-brokered peace deal with Russia could encourage more invasions in the future, for example of neighbouring Moldova, where breakaway Transnistria last year appealed to Russia for protection.
‘That echoed similar ‘appeals’ from inside Ukraine which set in motion the illegal Russian annexations of its territories: the Crimean Peninsula in 2014, and the Luhansk and Donetsk regions in 2022,’ according to experts from think tank Chatham House.
Any peace deal is expected to include Russia keeping territory it has annexed since 2014, including the Crimean peninsula – a huge blow to Kyiv after three years of fighting for freedom.
Downing Street has long declared that Russia should not be rewarded for its illegal invasion by being permitted to retain territories it has taken – a move UK officials fear could persuade Putin to use force again in the future.
Foreign Secretary David Lammy this morning reiterated that the UK stands ready to support Ukraine as part of an alliance of European nations.
The so-called Weimar+ statement by the UK, France, Germany and other allies stated: ‘We are ready to enhance our support for Ukraine. We commit to its independence, sovereignty and territorial integrity in the face of Russia’s war of aggression.
‘We share the goal to keep supporting Ukraine until a just, comprehensive and lasting peace is reached. A peace that guarantees the interest of Ukraine and our own.’
It added that the governments would continue to work towards this with their American allies, and that their ‘shared objectives should be to put Ukraine in a position of strength.’
Amid concerns that a unfavourable peace settlement for Ukraine could help Russia to prepare for a future conflict in Europe, defence officials have sounded the alarm that NATO nations are underprepared for a large-scale war.
France’s Defence Minister Sebastien Lecornu said today that NATO faces a moment of reckoning on its future, adding that NATO allies needed to think long-term and beef up their defence industries as Washington demands that Europe take security into its own hands.
‘It’s a crucial moment of truth,’ Lecornu told reporters ahead of a NATO meeting in Brussels.
‘People call it the most important, the strongest military alliance in history. That’s historically true – but the question is, will it still be true 10 or 15 years from now.’
Previously, Admiral Rob Bauer, the chairman of NATO’s Military Committee, has warned the alliance must brace itself for an all-out war with Russia in the next two decades, while Norway’s defence minister said it should be ready in two or three years.
Lecornu is a staunch loyalist of French President Emmanuel Macron, a fierce proponent of a more militarily independent Europe who once described NATO as brain dead during Trump’s first term and is pushing for EU countries to buy European when it comes to defence.
Conveying European fears that Trump could force Ukraine into a bad peace deal, he warned that this could embolden Putin and other western rivals, including Iran, North Korea and China.
‘Either we are within the parameters of a discussion that will genuinely bring peace through strength, or, on the contrary, it will be peace through weakness’, he said adding the latter could lead to ‘dramatic security situations’ and a ‘widening of the conflict’.
Experts have said that Vladimir Putin is appeasing Donald Trump with the peace talks, adding that a deal would not stop the Kremlin’s warmongering and could result in more invasions in the future (Putin and Trump pictured together in 2017)
Ukrainians ride a tank in the Kharkiv region, eastern Ukraine, 10 February 2025, amid the ongoing Russian invasion
Ukrainian forces firing a 120mm mortar towards Russian positions at an undisclosed location near Chasiv Yar in the Donetsk region, on February 8
Taken as a whole, NATO is by far the world’s most formidable military force.
The alliance’s 31 countries have a combined military budget of over $1.1 trillion, over three million active personnel, 2.7 million reserve personnel and more than 700,000 troops in paramilitary forces.
On top of that, in the event of an all-out war, the alliance’s members could collectively call up more than 206 million people for military service (based on their populations of military-aged civilians).
NATO countries also have over 14,000 tanks in their arsenals and tens of thousands more combat vehicles, 21,000 military aircraft and almost 2,000 naval vessels.
Three nuclear armed nations are also members: the US, the UK and France.
But if the US under Donald Trump and Canada are removed from this equation, the playing field between Russia and NATO’s European members becomes more level.
European NATO states still lead Russia in almost all categories, aside from the number of armoured land vehicles.
But with Putin’s invasion of Ukraine, Russia has demonstrated a willingness to sacrifice tens of thousands of soldiers for its imperialistic ambitions.
NATO has never been tested against such aggression, and doubts remain over whether its member nations would be willing or capable to do the same and replicate the Ukrainians’ heroic and dogged defence of their homeland.
Ukrainian servicemen of the Skala battalion take part in a field military exercise in the Donetsk region on February 3, 2024, amid Russia’s on-going invasion of Ukraine
A drone shot shows Britain’s 2nd Battalion The Royal Anglian Regiment, also known as ‘The Poachers’, gathering for a photo during exercises in their role as the infantry core of NATO’s Spearhead Battlegroup
While not a huge country, Ukraine still had a pre-war population of around 40 million people, and the existential nature of Putin’s invasion meant thousands of Ukrainians rushed to serve their country’s army.
Having already experienced a partial Russian-backed invasion in 2014, Ukraine has also bolstered its military into what turned out to be a formidable force.
Other countries that border Russia do not have the same numbers.
The Baltic states of Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia) – which all border either Russia or its Kaliningrad enclave and were all once under the Soviet Union’s iron fist – have populations of 2.7 million, 1.8 million and 1.2 million respectively.
They have similarly small military budgets ($2.23bn, 1.09bn and 1.44bn) and active personnel (23,000, 17,250 and 7,700), and have no main battle tanks between them.
The three nations also have a small air force and navy. None have nuclear weapons.
Relative to their size, the Baltic states do boast an impressive military reserve, with Lithuania having 104,000 people in reserve – more than the UK and Germany.
Estonia, too, has more than 78,000 people in reserve, while Latvia has 36,000.
But even if they called on their reserves, all three would be heavily reliant on their NATO allies to come to their aid in the event of a Russian assault into the Baltics.
Further West, Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022 kicked Germany into gear, with the government vowing to inject 100 billion Euros into its military to rebuild it.
It was set to make the country the world’s third biggest military spender.
However, this was largely done to keep up with NATO’s 2 percent of GDP spending requirement, and since the announcement, Chancellor Olaf Scholz and the government have been accused of falling short on its promise to modernise.
Before the war, Germany had around 183,000 active military personnel and 29,000 in reserve, more than 300 tanks, 662 aircraft and a sizeable navy.
The country would be one of the major powers in Europe expected to help repel any invasion along NATO’s eastern flank, along with the likes of the UK and France.
Of the three, France has the largest active arm, with over 200,000 personnel, and 141,000 in reserve. It also has the most tanks (more than 400) and more than 1,200 aircraft, as well as the largest navy.
Like Germany, French MPs approved a boost in military spending in the wake of the Ukraine war, approving a budget that would spend 413 billion euros on defence between 2024 and 2030 – also with an aim to modernise.
As for the UK, recent weeks have seen discussions over whether Britain would be able to fight effectively in a significant European conflict.
Michael Clarke, the former director-general of the Royal United Services Institute (RUSI), told MailOnline last year that the army must be better at driving recruitment and at least ‘get over the 100,000 mark’.
British Army Challenger 2 tanks are seen at the training ground in Nowa Deba on September 21, 2022, in Nowa Deba, Subcarpathian Voivodeship, Poland
A Germany army Leopard 2A6 tank takes part in the NATO military exercise ‘Iron Wolf 2022-II’ at a training range in Pabrade, Lithuania on Wednesday, October 26, 2022
The British Army is currently made up of around 74,000 soldiers, plummeting from 102,000 in 2006. General Sanders said boosting Army numbers in preparation for a potential conflict would need to be a ‘whole-of-nation undertaking’.
MPs were told by the Commons Defenc Committee last year that the UK’s ability to fight an all-out war has been marred by shortages and a recruitment crisis.
The Commons Defence Committee said the military is ‘consistently overstretched’, with the demands of operations personnel leaving little time for training in warfighting.
The committee’s inquiry heard that the ‘hollowing out’ of the Armed Forces since 2010 had undermined the UK’s warfighting resilience, and that their reduction in size meant they would exhaust their capabilities ‘after the first couple of months of the engagement’ in a peer-on-peer war.
