While Ukraine has signed up to a US cease-fire plan, Russian President Vladimir Putin has equivocated –- effectively saying “yes, but.”
Trump has said it would be “disappointing” if Putin doesn’t sign up, but did not want to be drawn on what leverage he may have to push him to agree to the 30-day truce.
So, what can he do? There seem to be three options.
Sanctions
Trump said he could do “things financially that would be very bad for Russia.”
This sounds like a hint of extra sanctions, and Trump also threatened as much in a recent post on his Truth Social network.
Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent and Kevin Hackett, head of the National Economic Council, have echoed Trump’s comments but not provided any detail of what tougher sanctions would look like.
Hackett spoke recently of “sticks and carrots.”
On March 13, the administration took action by not extending a sanctions waiver on selected Russian banks facilitating payments for oil and gas.
This makes it harder for other countries to make these purchases. Reestablishing the waiver would be a carrot, and the United States have raised the prospect of sanctions relief if Moscow negotiates.
Putin has indicated he wants bigger carrots, such as demilitarizing Ukraine and stopping US weapons supplies to Kyiv.
In terms of sticks, Hackett said there was “a heck of a lot of things” that could be done but did not name any of them.
One option that’s been discussed would be imposing secondary sanctions on third countries that buy Russian oil above a Western-imposed price cap of $60 a barrel (the current market price is around $70). The biggest customers are China, India, and Turkey (in that order).
Another idea might be to reduce the level of the cap, further slashing Russian revenues. This would require coordination with Western allies.
Russia has used a “shadow fleet” of aging oil tankers to circumvent existing sanctions. This could also face tighter sanctions, by adding more vessels to the proscribed list, for example.
But it’s a game of cat and mouse. Vessels often go through multiple ownership changes involving numerous shell companies. Enforcement requires substantial effort and resources.
Another step that’s been mooted would be to ban imports of products based on Russian crude oil refined in third countries.
Measures such as these would tighten the screw on the Russian economy.
But they would not be a quick fix and would be unlikely to have the same rapid effect that Washington’s weapons supply freeze appeared to have in pushing Ukraine to agree to the cease-fire plan.
Tariffs
In other international disputes, Trump’s weapon of choice is tariffs, and he could certainly impose them on Russia. But the effect would likely be very limited.
Trump’s use of sanctions has caused deep concern in other countries, such as China, Canada, and European Union members. But these are all major US trading partners with plenty to lose.
Russia, by contrast, hardly sells anything to the United States.
“Russian exports to the US dropped by more than 80% last year, compared to the pre-war period, to about $3bn, the lowest since 1992,” noted Alexander Kolyandr in a recent article for the Center for European Policy Analysis.
“This represents about 10 days-worth of Russian exports to China in 2024.”
A non-tariff measure Trump suggested in January was persuading Saudi Arabia to drive down the price of oil by ramping up production. But this would seem unlikely to match Saudi interests.
Guns
Trump’s special envoy to Russia and Ukraine, Keith Kellogg, has laid out a third way that Washington could wave a stick at Russia.
In June last year, he unveiled a plan to get both sides to the negotiating table quickly.
“We tell the Ukrainians, ‘You’ve got to come to the table, and if you don’t come to the table, support from the United States will dry up,'” he said.
“And you tell Putin…if you don’t come to the table, then we’ll give Ukrainians everything they need to kill you in the field.”
So far, we’ve seen the first part of this scenario. It was quick and easy to achieve. It was also cheap, since withholding military aid is obviously cheaper to US taxpayers than providing it.
There are major questions about the second part, not least that Kellogg himself has not played a prominent role in negotiations so far.
Flooding Ukraine with weapons would be an expensive endeavor for a US president who has spoken so often about how the war has already cost Americans too much. It would also represent a dizzying political turnaround. Trump has warned Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy that he is “gambling with World War III.”
Washington may judge that the second part of Kellogg’s strategy is just too risky.
