Trump urged to learn from Afghanistan, not pressure Ukraine

Daniel Fried, former US ambassador to Poland, has urged President Donald Trump to take lessons from the US withdrawal from Afghanistan and avoid pushing Ukraine into an unfavorable peace agreement with Russia.

Trump is seeking to broker an end to the war between Kyiv and Moscow. After initially proposing a 28-point plan, discussions have now been narrowed to a 19-point framework, which Ukraine largely supports; however, Russia’s position remains uncertain.

European officials have expressed concern that Trump may pressure Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky to accept any agreement. Experts at a recent Atlantic Council meeting warned that a poorly negotiated deal could represent a “strategic failure for the free world.”

Some analysts have drawn parallels between Trump’s push to end the Ukraine conflict and the hasty US and NATO withdrawal from Afghanistan, which led to the rapid collapse of the previous government and the return of the Islamic Emirate to power.

Daniel Fried, the former US ambassador to Poland who helped lead the West’s response to Moscow’s aggression against Ukraine after 2014’s illegal annexation of Crimea, said the conflict in Europe and the Afghanistan war are “not alike” – but lessons can and should be learned.

“A bad framework, such as the happily-overtaken 28 points, could presage a strategic defeat for Ukraine, for Europe, and for the free world generally,” he told The Independent. “We seem to be past that point, perhaps because some within the administration recognised that failure in Ukraine could indeed become Trump’s Big Defeat.

“The lesson to be learned? Don’t sign on to bad deals for the sake of signing something,” he said.