U.S. President Donald Trump is ready to bring peace to Ukraine, and he says he will work, quote,

very closely with Russia's president Vladimir Putin to make it happen. But there is a problem. He won't

commit any U.S. money or troops. This is Swamp Notes, the weekly podcast from the FT News Briefing, where we talk about all of the things happening in U.S. politics.

I'm Mark Filipino, and this week we're asking, what happens if Trump goes it alone in trying to settle the Ukraine conflict?

Here with me to discuss is Max Sedan. He covers Russia for the FT.

Hi, Max. Hi. We've also got Keir Giles, a senior fellow at Chatham House and the author of a new book called

Who Will Defend Europe and Awakened Russia and a Sleeping Continent? Hi, Kier. Hello, Mark.

So, Max, why don't you catch us up? On Wednesday, Donald Trump had a 90-minute call with Vladimir Putin, and when he finished,

he wrote on Truth Social, the social media network, that negotiations on Ukraine would begin immediately.

What do we know about this phone call and what signal does it send for these peace talks?

Well, Donald Trump, in the course of these 90 minutes, basically through three years of

Western policy on supporting Ukraine against the Russian invasion, out of the window.

Under foreign president Joe Biden, the motto everybody was working under was nothing about

Ukraine without Ukraine.

And the idea was very much that Ukraine's allies in the

U.S. and Europe had a joint strategy that they would work on together on bringing Russia to the

table. And Trump essentially dispensed of that and revealed a view that I think is much closer

to Putin's view of this,

which is not a question of Russia invading a sovereign country. This is about talks between two

great powers. He didn't inform Ukraine or any European countries about the call in advance.

And the message that the administration has been sending this week is very

much that we will agree some sort of deal and we will present it to Ukraine at some point.

...