Commentary by Stephen Macaulay
On February 24, 2022, Russia attacked Ukraine. Russian president Vladmir Putin wanted to seize land from a sovereign state. So his troops rolled west and the bombs started falling from the sky on Ukraine.
There have been unrelenting attacks on Ukraine for four years.
Early on in the conflict you could see signs in the US reading “Slava Ukraini!” and blue and yellow flags in front yards. Lapel pins sprouted on members of Congress from both sides of the aisle.
For a while.
It must be admitted that the US has half-assed its support to Ukraine. Biden was reticent to provide what he must have thought to be “too much backing” lest Putin became annoyed and retaliated against the US in a big way.
Trump, the man who claimed he would end the war when he got back into office, has been wildly less supportive of Ukraine since he’s been in office.
Every time there seems to be a negotiation about merely a possible ceasefire Moscow appears to think it over — then sends in the attack drones in massive numbers.
What does Trump do in response?
Nothing.
In the infamous Oval Office meeting between Donald Trump, Volodymyr Zelenskyy and JD Vance there were lines like this: Vance: "I'm talking about the kind of diplomacy that's going to end the destruction of your country. Mr. President, with respect, I think it's disrespectful for you to come into the Oval Office to try to litigate this in front of the American media. Right now, you guys are going around and forcing conscripts to the front lines because you have manpower problems. You should be thanking the president for trying to bring an end to this conflict."
That was February 28, 2025. More than a year later, that “kind of diplomacy” has done nothing but gotten a lot more Ukrainian causalities.
Trump: "You're not in a good position. You don't have the cards right now. With us, you start having cards."
Zelenskyy: "I'm not playing cards. I'm very serious, Mr. President. I'm very serious."
Trump: "You're playing cards. You're gambling with the lives of millions of people. You're gambling with World War III."
Zelenskyy: "What are you speaking about?"
Trump: "You're gambling with World War III. And what you're doing is very disrespectful to the country, this country that's backed you far more than a lot of people said they should have."
Vance: "Have you said thank you once?"
And on it went. The president of a country that is fighting for its very existence being tag teamed.
It was humiliating — for all Americans who thought our leaders were better than that.
The war continues.
According to a February 23, 2026 report from the Council on Foreign Relations: “Since Trump assumed office in January 2025, there has been no legislation or other authorizations of significant new aid to Ukraine. However, a substantial amount of the aid appropriated under the Biden administration is still in the pipeline, and deliveries of aid packages have continued, although on two occasions the Trump administration temporarily paused some deliveries. As of December 31, 2025, the US had disbursed 58 percent of the $188 billion in spending related to the conflict (US spending is first appropriated, then obligated, then disbursed). Nonetheless, the lack of new aid commitments means that US aid deliveries are running out.”
And of that $188 billion it isn’t all cash or munitions going straight to Ukraine. Far from it.
Again the CFR: “A large share of the money in the aid bills has been spent in the United States, paying for US factories and workers to produce weapons that are either shipped to Ukraine or used to replenish stocks of US weapons the Pentagon has sent to Ukraine during the war. A 2023 analysis by the American Enterprise Institute found that Ukraine aid spending was funding defense manufacturing in more than seventy US cities.”
Yes, paying for US manufacturing jobs.
There can be little in the way of argument that the regime that US and Israeli bombs took out in Iran will be missed.
But here we have a situation where for no apparent reason — and this war has been going on for days so we ought to know by now — the US decided to go to full-bore war.
It is surprising that Pete Hegseth doesn’t eat an uncooked tomahawk steak during his press briefings, ripping the meat from the bone with his teeth between talking about “laser focused” and “we set the tempo.” You can tell his animal spirits are high when he talks about munitions.
But going back to Russia, its Foreign Ministry posted on Telegram (apparently, they haven’t downloaded the Truth Social app) on Saturday the 28th that the US-Israeli strikes on Iran are "a preplanned and unprovoked act of armed aggression against a sovereign and independent UN member state.”
Perhaps they missed the irony that one of the initial member states of the UN is … Ukraine.
NBC News reports: “Russia is providing intelligence to Iran on the location of US forces in the Middle East, a boost for Tehran as it launches missile and drone attacks on American bases and other targets in the region, according to four sources with knowledge of the matter.
“The intelligence assistance from Russia could help Iran locate American warships, radar or other communication systems, but there is no indication Moscow is helping direct Iranian missile or drone strikes, the sources said.”
Could there be a more-naïve clause than “but there is no indication Moscow is helping direct Iranian missile or drone strikes”?
Let’s see: providing intelligence about location but not helping direct things to locations? What would be the point otherwise?
Yes, the US does provide Ukraine with intelligence — but under the Trump administration it is handling it like a card that it will put back in the deck whenever. And the information provided is about energy installations, not military assets and personnel.
So the Russians can be highly critical of the US, the Russians can directly involve themselves in fighting against American forces, and the Trump Administration does what?
The Ukrainian people are fighting for their lives. They are fighting for the continued existence of their free country.
And what does the US do? It goes to war against Iran, seemingly with no plans for how things will go not only after the country’s leadership has been killed but after much of the country has been pummeled by bombs.
The lack of substantive support for Ukraine and the bombing of Iran, apparently for no reason beyond “because we can,” is further evidence of the unseriousness of the Trump Administration.
Just four days before the bombing of Iran commenced, Donald Trump said in his State of the Union of Iran: “We are in negotiations with them. They want to make a deal, but we haven't heard those secret words, ‘We will never have a nuclear weapon.’ My preference, my preference is to solve this problem through diplomacy. But one thing is certain, I will never allow the world's No. 1 sponsor of terror, which they are by far, to have a nuclear weapon. Can't let that happen.”
Prior to that he noted: “As president, I will make peace wherever I can, but I will never hesitate to confront threats to America wherever we must. That's why in a breakthrough operation last June, the United States military obliterated Iran's nuclear weapons program with an attack on Iranian soil known as Operation Midnight Hammer.”
So the US “obliterated Iran’s nuclear weapons program” and Iran’s now non-extent government “want to make a deal” and a few days later we went to war with Iran.
He talked during his address to Congress also about gas prices and the stock market. The former is skyrocketing and the latter in the three financial indices are falling.
“Our country is winning again. In fact, we're winning so much that we really don't know what to do about it. People are asking me, please, please, please, Mr. President, we're winning too much. We can't take it anymore. We're not used to winning in our country until you came along, we're just always losing. But now we're winning too much. And I say, no, no, no, you're going to win again. You're going to win big. You're going to win bigger than ever.”
Winning at what price? Winning for whom?
Macaulay is pundit-at-large for The Hustings, writing primarily for the right column.