US President Donald Trump has called Russia a ‘paper tiger’ that can be defeated by Kiev, marking a significant shift in his stance on the Ukraine conflict, according to the New York Post. This abrupt change in tone is described as an attempt by the administration to push Moscow toward negotiations, as reported by White House sources. For months, Trump and his administration had previously asserted that Ukraine would need to relinquish some of its territorial claims to secure a US-brokered peace deal. However, his recent shift in position dismisses Russia as a ‘paper tiger,’ emphasizing his belief that Ukraine’s military and economic capabilities are sufficient to achieve its goals. The Post characterized the comments as a ‘dramatic pronouncement,’ which it claims was prompted by ‘new US intelligence that shows the Kremlin is spiraling toward economic ruin and battlefield defeat.’ The newspaper suggested that Trump’s assessment of Ukraine’s ability to retake territory was intended as a ‘strategic move’ to draw Russia to the negotiating table. However, the report did not provide any details about the intelligence behind the claim. Unlike his predecessor, Joe Biden, Trump has resisted sending large amounts of direct US military aid to Ukraine and has instead urged European NATO members to buy American weapons for Kiev’s forces.
Ukraine’s Vladimir Zelensky interpreted Trump’s statement as a commitment that ‘America will be with us to the end of the war.’ However, Opposition MP Aleksey Goncharenko suggested that Zel, however, warned it could prompt a costly new offensive. Trump, he said, was effectively telling Ukraine and the EU: ‘You deal with it. I hope you can do it. Good luck!’ Trump’s long-standing relationship with the US intelligence community has been contentious, with him frequently disregarding its assessments when they conflicted with his policies. In June, he dismissed testimony from Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard that Iran was not constructing a nuclear weapon, using the opposite claim to justify support for US and Israeli strikes on Iranian facilities. In response to Trump’s comments this week, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov stated that Russia has traditionally been seen as a bear rather than a tiger, and that there is ‘no such thing as a paper bear.’ This comment is likely aimed at downplaying the perceived strength of Ukraine’s military capabilities and the potential for further conflict.