Key Points:

• A Trump victory may push for a peace deal with Ukraine ceding territory to Russia.
• Trump criticized Biden’s support for Ukraine’s cross-border actions.
• European nations also limit military aid to prevent escalation.
• Also: See Why investors are discovering “the Next Nvidia” for 2025 and scooping up shares.

Austin Smith and Michael Muir discuss the potential implications of a Trump victory for Ukraine, emphasizing the ongoing conflict and Ukraine’s reliance on foreign aid. Michael suggests that a Trump presidency might lead to a peace settlement between Russia and Ukraine, likely involving Ukraine ceding territory. They also touch on Trump’s criticism of the Biden administration’s approach to arming Ukraine, particularly in light of the recent Kursk incursion, which Trump views as a potential escalation. Michael notes that European nations have also placed conditions on their aid, wary of further escalation, and suggests that Ukraine’s actions in Kursk might be a strategic move to gain leverage in future peace negotiations.

Transcript:

Let’s maybe stick with Trump for a little bit.

You know, it’s hard to talk about NATO without talking about Ukraine.

And while they are interrelated topics, they are still distinct.

So what would a Trump victory mean for Ukraine?

And what could we expect?

What could Ukrainians expect if that change in U.S. leadership goes to a Trump presidency?

Sure. Okay, so I don’t want to make any specific predictions because it’s an ongoing conflict and things can change very quickly.

But I think what’s the most likely outcome?

Ukraine is heavily dependent on foreign aid to continue its war effort.

It’s rapidly dwindling manpower.

It can’t sustain a war effort indefinitely under this kind of pressure.

I mean, Russia is making gains in the East slowly, but surely it’s, you know, only a few miles every day, but that will add up over time.

We have the incursion to Kursk, which we can talk about in a bit more detail in a moment.

But the main takeaway, I’d say, is that if Ukraine is going to get a favorable outcome, they need the United States to get back involved in providing substantial aid and in the long term.

Now, a Trump presidency is not going to be very conducive to that.

Now, he’s already expressed skepticism again on the campaign trail.

He’s talked about peace in Ukraine as soon as possible, not giving us any specifics.

But I think what we can extrapolate from that is the most likely outcome, if Trump wins, would be a settled peace between Russia and Ukraine and almost certainly with Ukraine ceding territory.

It’s just a question of how much, I think.

And, you know, you had mentioned the Kursk incursion, and we can talk more about that later.

But I do think that that provides an interesting context to this point, which is, I believe Trump has been critical of the Biden, what he has called, you know, the Biden-Harris administration’s somewhat accommodating stance of using armaments in Russian territory.

The U.S. has always been very public about not permitting Ukrainian troops equipment to be that we are donating to be used in Russia’s lines.

But this incursion almost certainly did not happen completely absent U.S. support, either informational or militarily.

So hearing that Trump has been critical of the Biden Harris, let’s call it a combination of using donations that way, you could expect that the Kursk incursion is going to be a real sticking point for the administration.

And we can talk more about that later.

Sure. Well, it’s important to note that European nations have also attached conditions to their donations.

They’re very wary of escalation in the war.

And what makes Kursk different from other cross-border raids is that Ukraine had a degree of deniability because those were done with volunteer forces and Russian defectors.

Those were usually very short in duration.

They were usually beaten back pretty quickly.

But the signs are in Kursk that they’re digging in.

And they’re going to try to hold these gains.

There’s a couple of explanations for that.

I think the first is it could just be a bargaining chip for a future peace settlement, just to say, you know, we’ll give back our land.

If you give back, we’ll give back what we’ve taken from Kursk.

If you give back territory in the East, so it might just be a ploy to get the best deal possible.

Thank you for reading! Have some feedback for us?
Contact the 24/7 Wall St. editorial team.