Well into the September 10 debate between the U.S. presidential candidates, ABC News anchor David Muir posed a question to Republican nominee Donald Trump: “Do you want Ukraine to win this war?”
Trump refused to answer directly. “I want the war to stop,” he said. When Muir repeated the question, Trump again evaded: “I think it’s in the U.S. best interest to get this war finished and just get it done.”
Reflecting the instincts of a cold war veteran, Joe Biden’s strategy was familiar: contain the conflict. When the US president spoke in Warsaw in March 2022, a month after Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, he drew a red line at Vladimir Putin’s toes. “Don’t even think about moving on one single inch of Nato territory,” he warned.
