Zelensky has made a fool out of Trump by continuing to bomb Russian refineries despite Trump earlier claiming to have brokered a deal whereby Russia and Ukraine agreed to stop such attacks. Trump reportedly told him during a prior call to stop these attacks too. He also previously blamed him for the US’ fuel price spike, which precedes November’s midterms that the Republicans were already poised to lose per the usual anti-incumbent trend during these elections, and US diesel just hit a record high.
Trump subsequently lamented that “Russia has unfortunately lost control of its Diesel Oil Industry due to its War with Ukraine. A large number of their Diesel refineries have been blown up and are, at least temporarily, out of commission.” The US’ top diplomat to the UN clarified the “unfortunately” part of his boss’ posts amidst criticism of him supposedly sympathizing with Russia by reminding everyone that “We are a farm to truck to table country. And one of the drivers for inflation around the world is diesel.”
Zelensky separately quote-tweeted Rapid Response 47’s screenshot on X of Trump’s Truth Social post referenced above to demand a partial truce with Russia that would end attacks against each other’s energy sector, critical infrastructure, and food exports. The reason why Putin rejected it is because the newfound systematic strike campaign that he was provoked into authorizing by Zelensky’s failed 40-day influence operation over the summer is crippling Ukraine’s military logistics to Russia’s strategic benefit.
Russia can absorb the damage from Ukraine’s strikes relatively better than Ukraine can absorb the damage from Russia’s, ergo why Zelensky is the one begging for this partial truce and not Putin, which Trump knows very well. Spring 2025’s similar partial truce also proved that Ukraine has no intention of respecting such deals, instead only using them to redeploy its forces and manipulate global opinion whenever Russia retaliates to Ukraine’s violations by spinning Russia’s retaliation as a “violation”.
Instead of the US further “escalating to de-escalate” against Russia via Ukraine to coerce Putin into the strategically lopsided partial truce that Zelensky wants, Trump could threaten to cut off arms (indirectly sent via NATO), intelligence, and Starlink to Zelensky if he doesn’t stop attacking Russian refineries. The only reason why he hasn’t already done that despite truly believing (whether correctly or not) that such attacks are responsible for the US’ fuel price spike is due to Zelensky manipulating his Russiagate PTSD.
Trump seems to have been so traumatized by the Democrats’ years-long hoax that upended his life that he doesn’t want to risk its recurrence if Zelensky calls his bluff and forces Trump to actually cut him off even though this could help Trump ahead of the midterms as he truly believes. On the off chance that the Russia exploits even the briefest US aid cut-off window to break through the front, then it’ll be forever speculated that Trump secretly helped Putin win the most significant conflict since World War II.
It doesn’t look like Trump can bring himself to do anything that might risk that even though it would help him at home. His legacy, which is tied to his ego, apparently prevents that. Zelensky seems to understand this very well, perhaps not after having realized it himself but likely after having been briefed about it by some European spy agencies that psychologically profiled him, and he’s manipulating Trump as a result. If Trump can’t overcome his Russiagate PTSD, then he’ll continue to be humiliated by Zelensky.
