February 20, 2025 • 13 mins
Monday marks the three year anniversary of Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine. And over the last few days, Trump has revealed his approach to ending the conflict. It would reverse years of US foreign policy in the region and has, so far, left Ukraine out of direct conversations with Russia.
On today’s Big Take DC podcast, Bloomberg reporter Iain Marlow takes us inside the historic US-Russia talks in Saudi Arabia and explains what Trump’s pivot in policy and alliances could mean for America’s role on the global stage.
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Speaker 1 (00:02):
Bloomberg Audio Studios, podcasts, radio news.
Speaker 2 (00:10):
Monday marks three years since Russia's full scale invasion of Ukraine.
Speaker 3 (00:14):
Russian President Vladimir Putin has announced to military operation in Ukraine.
Speaker 2 (00:19):
Unleashing the worst security crisis in Europe since World War II.
President Trump campaigned on a promise to end the war
quote in one day, and recently he's revealed his approach
to ending the conflict. But it's a path that reverses
years of US foreign policy in the region. Here's Trump
speaking on Wednesday, a dictator without elections. Zelensky better move
(00:43):
fast or he's not going to have a country level
He's called Ukrainian President Voladimir Zelensky a dictator while engaging
in direct contact with Russian President Vladimir Putin. His team
has also held closed door talks with Russian officials in
Saudi Arabia that excluded Ukraine. One policy U turn after another.
Speaker 1 (01:03):
I think what we've seen over the past week is
the Trump administration really being willing to go where the
Biden administration was not when it comes to Russia and Ukraine.
Speaker 2 (01:16):
That's Bloomberg reporter Ian Marlowe. He was justin Ryod where
he got a first hand look at the US strategy shift,
and he's been tracking its reverberations throughout.
Speaker 1 (01:26):
Europe, making outreach to Russia that potentially alienates Europe, definitely
alienates Ukraine with the idea of a sort of Hail
Mary attempt to end the war.
Speaker 2 (01:41):
Zelensky has expressed an openness to direct talks with Russia,
but criticized Trump for his approach. He called out Trump
for a false claim he made on Tuesday that it
was Ukraine that started the war. You should have never
started it. You could have made a deal, as Trump
charges forward. Zelensky warned that Ukraine would not RECOGNI any
agreements quote about US without US. So where does that
(02:05):
leave hopes of an end to the war and what's
on the table for those negotiations from Bloomberg's Washington bureau.
This is the Big Take DC Podcast. I'm Salaia Moosen
today on the show inside the latest efforts to end
the war between Russia and Ukraine and what Washington's policy
(02:26):
pivot could mean for America's role as a superpower on
the global stage. Last Wednesday, President Trump got on the
phone with Russian President Vladimir Putin. It was the first
publicly announced contact between Putin and a US president since
(02:47):
Russia launched a full scale invasion of Ukraine in February
twenty twenty two.
Speaker 1 (02:51):
We had a great call, and it lasted for a
long time, over an hour. The frenzy and pace at
which the US and the Trump administration now is engaging
on foreign policy and engaging in ways that are very
disruptive and very new and are one hundred and eighty
degrees different than what the Biden administration was doing. I
(03:14):
think that's got a lot of people discombobulated.
Speaker 2 (03:18):
During the Biden administration, the US refused to engage with
Russia on the war in Ukraine, and as Bloomberg's Ian
Marlow says, that's in part because Russia hadn't shown signs
that it was serious about wanting to end it. Putin
has sunk enormous resources into achieving his goal of claiming
Ukraine as part of Russia.
Speaker 1 (03:36):
The Biden administration thought it would be pointless that Putin
was not interested in coming to peace with Ukraine, that
he wanted to subjugate Ukraine. That's why people think this
negotiation process that the Trump administration is trying to launch
is so fraught with risk.
Speaker 2 (03:55):
Trump is gaming out an approach that he'd touted on
the campaign trail for months last year, getting on the
phone and striking a deal. But his move flew in
the face of a US approach that had centered on
Ukrainian involvement and cooperation with European allies.
Speaker 1 (04:10):
Plus, the US wants to basically wind down military and
other humanitarian financial aid to Ukraine because they don't think
the US taxpayer is going to support it for much longer.
Speaker 2 (04:25):
Trump's Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said as much. The same
day that Trump spoke to Putin. Hegseth addressed NATO allies
and Brussels and told them the burden of supporting Ukraine
was going to fall on them.
Speaker 3 (04:37):
Europe must provide the overwhelming share of future lethal and
non lethal aid to Ukraine.
Speaker 2 (04:44):
Bloomberg Economics is estimated that protecting Ukraine and expanding militaries
across Europe could cost the continent's major powers an additional
three point one trillion dollars over the next decade. Hegseth
also made waves by hinting at some of the concessions
the US might be willing to make and ordered to
broker peace between Russia and Ukraine.
Speaker 1 (05:04):
Which was unlikely that Ukraine would hold onto all its territory,
unlikely that it's going to be a member of NATO.
Those are kind of Russian goals for this, and a
lot of people were criticizing Hexath for sort of giving
up some of that leverage before the talks had even begun.
Speaker 2 (05:22):
Two days after Hegseth's comments, leaders from around the world
convene at the Munich Security Conference to discuss the most
pressing diplomatic and security issues.
Speaker 1 (05:32):
Munich was a really eye opening experience for people in
Europe because of what it said about the Transatlantic Alliance.
Speaker 2 (05:41):
Vice President J. D. Vance took the podium on the
first day.
Speaker 1 (05:44):
And basically excoriated European leaders and governments for being sort
of old world liberal elite society that was suppressing right
wing speech.
Speaker 3 (05:57):
What I worry about is the threat from within, the
retreat of Europe from some of its most fundamental values,
values shared with the United States of America.
Speaker 2 (06:09):
That same day, Van sat down with Zelensky in Munich.
Zelensky said he was looking forward to more meetings about
how to end the war.
Speaker 3 (06:17):
Really will want this very much, but we need real
security guarantees.
Speaker 2 (06:22):
And then on Tuesday, a last minute meeting was held
in Saudi Arabia, top US and Russian officials, including Secretary
of State Marco Rubio and his Russian counterpart Sergei Lavrov,
sat down for over four hours without any European allies
and without Ukraine.
Speaker 1 (06:39):
The US has been careful to not characterize these as
a negotiation, in that the US is sitting down at
the table with the Russians and hammering out Ukraine's future
without Ukraine. It is a balancing act that the Biden
administration tried to strike, trying not to lead Ukraine along
(07:00):
too much, but trying to support them and trying to
let Ukraine lead the process. And one outcome of that
was basically that the US took a back seat and said,
you know nothing about Ukraine without Ukraine.
Speaker 2 (07:14):
That made this week's meeting novel because it left Ukraine
out of the room.
Speaker 1 (07:18):
It's not clear at the moment on the US side
who made that decision. I think they feel that after
several years of talking with Ukraine and hearing from their leaders,
they have a fairly good idea what Ukraine wants out
of this. They want their land back. They want the
(07:40):
war to end, but they don't want it to end
on terms that would prevent Ukraine from becoming part of NATO,
becoming part of the EU, or giving up any of
its sovereign rights.
Speaker 2 (07:54):
As for Ukraine's Zelenski.
Speaker 1 (07:56):
He wasn't invited.
Speaker 2 (07:57):
Coincidentally, Zelenski had plans to be in Saudi Arabia that day.
Speaker 1 (08:02):
And he canceled his trip, and he was fairly angry
in his comments. He looks like he's getting cut out
of the process right now. The pace at which the
Trump administration has been willing to toss out the USU
relationship to some degree and make this in some ways
unprecedented outreach to Russia over the head of the EU
(08:25):
and to start engaging in some kind of talks that
we saw here in Saudi Arabia without Europe, without Ukraine,
that this is deeply shocking, and I think a lot
of people in Europe are worried that the US is
willing to sell out Ukraine to some degree in terms
of letting them give up territory or other things to
(08:46):
try and get a deal to try and end the war,
because that would be a big diplomatic coup to some
degree for Trump.
Speaker 2 (08:55):
Coming up inside the room, were US and Russian officials
met this week and where the talks could go from here.
Bloomberg reporter Ian Marlow was in Saudi Arabia for the
landmarks sit down between US and Russian officials on Tuesday.
Speaker 1 (09:18):
The talks were held at one of the Saudi palaces,
the Dria Palace, sort of marble floors, ornate chandeliers. There
was a big formal meeting room where we were kind
of ushered in.
Speaker 2 (09:30):
On the US side, Secretary of State Mark or Rubio,
National Security Advisor Mike Waltz, Middle East Envoice Steve Whitkoff,
and on the Russian side, diplomats like Foreign Minister Sergei
Lavrov and Foreign Policy aid Yuri Ushikov.
Speaker 1 (09:45):
No one was looking happy in the room. These are
serious things to discuss, and I think the US side
knows to some degree that they're taking a chance here,
and on the Russian side of the table too, decades
of diplomatic experience, longtime Kremlin aides who have seen these
things come and go. And on the US side it
is a new US administration kind of bucking protocol to
(10:10):
some degree by launching these talks. It is a different
vibe on both sides of the table. But the US
side was almost constantly on the back foot to some
degree because the Russians kept leaking stuff to their delegation
and their reporters that came with them, and so the
news was always to some degree coming out of the
Russian side, and so they were really sort of framing
(10:33):
the narrative and the Russians feel like they have the
upper hand on the battlefield. It kind of looked and
felt like they might have had the upper hand coming
into these talks, just because they weren't the ones who
asked for them. Basically, this is kind of Trump wanting
to end the war. Putin appears to be quite happy
waging this war and doesn't seem in any rush to stop.
Speaker 2 (10:55):
Russian and US officials spoke for over four hours, setting
the stage for continue conversations.
Speaker 1 (11:01):
These talks have resulted in more talks, which is kind
of a classic diplomatic deliverable. You agree to keep talking
and it looks like you accomplish something other than that.
There wasn't too much concrete that came out of this
other than maybe beefing up embassy staffing for the Russians
(11:21):
in DC and for the US in Moscow and trying
to re engage and to kind of carry.
Speaker 2 (11:28):
This forward still. Ian says, given the years of diplomatic
freeze between the two countries, these talks were significant and
they sent a signal to the rest of the world
that the US isn't bound by historical alliances. On Monday,
EU member states met to work on a plan to
amp up military support for Ukraine. If financed by debt,
that could add an additional two point seven trillion dollars
(11:51):
to the borrowing needs of the five largest European NATO
members over the next decade. That's according to Bloomberg Economics.
As we heard toward the anniversary of the war, Ian says,
there are a few key questions. At the top of
his mind.
Speaker 1 (12:05):
Is the US willing to push Russia when it comes
to these negotiations. Are there going to be any Russian concessions?
What is the US willing to do to turn up
the pressure to bring them to the table. And also
we're going to be looking to see if there's a
Trump putin summit, which would then have a whole bunch
of pageantry and need to entail some kind of deliverables
on either side, Presumably.
Speaker 2 (12:27):
This week, a US special envoy visited Kiev to continue
consultations with Ukraine about ending the war. On Wednesday, amid
a bitter back and forth between the two leaders, Zelensky
accused Trump of being a victim of Russian disinformation and
looking ahead. On Sunday, German citizens will go to the
polls to elect a new government. That election could shape
(12:49):
the approach one of NATO's largest member countries takes to
the conflict. This is The Big Take DC from Bloomberg News.
I'm Salamosen. This episode was produced by Julia Press. It
was edited by Aaron Edwards, Greg White, and Larry Liebert.
(13:10):
It was mixed by Alex Sugia and fact checked by
adrian A. Tapia. Our senior producer is Naomi Shaven. Our
senior editor is Elizabeth Ponso. Our executive producer is Nicolebeamster Bower,
and Sage Bauman is Bloomberg's head of Podcasts. If you
like this episode, make sure to subscribe and review The
Big Take DC wherever you listen to podcasts. It helps
(13:30):
people find the show. Thanks for listening. We'll be back
next week.
Bloomberg Audio Studios, podcasts, radio news.
Speaker 2 (00:10):
Monday marks three years since Russia's full scale invasion of Ukraine.
Speaker 3 (00:14):
Russian President Vladimir Putin has announced to military operation in Ukraine.
Speaker 2 (00:19):
Unleashing the worst security crisis in Europe since World War II.
President Trump campaigned on a promise to end the war
quote in one day, and recently he's revealed his approach
to ending the conflict. But it's a path that reverses
years of US foreign policy in the region. Here's Trump
speaking on Wednesday, a dictator without elections. Zelensky better move
(00:43):
fast or he's not going to have a country level
He's called Ukrainian President Voladimir Zelensky a dictator while engaging
in direct contact with Russian President Vladimir Putin. His team
has also held closed door talks with Russian officials in
Saudi Arabia that excluded Ukraine. One policy U turn after another.
Speaker 1 (01:03):
I think what we've seen over the past week is
the Trump administration really being willing to go where the
Biden administration was not when it comes to Russia and Ukraine.
Speaker 2 (01:16):
That's Bloomberg reporter Ian Marlowe. He was justin Ryod where
he got a first hand look at the US strategy shift,
and he's been tracking its reverberations throughout.
Speaker 1 (01:26):
Europe, making outreach to Russia that potentially alienates Europe, definitely
alienates Ukraine with the idea of a sort of Hail
Mary attempt to end the war.
Speaker 2 (01:41):
Zelensky has expressed an openness to direct talks with Russia,
but criticized Trump for his approach. He called out Trump
for a false claim he made on Tuesday that it
was Ukraine that started the war. You should have never
started it. You could have made a deal, as Trump
charges forward. Zelensky warned that Ukraine would not RECOGNI any
agreements quote about US without US. So where does that
(02:05):
leave hopes of an end to the war and what's
on the table for those negotiations from Bloomberg's Washington bureau.
This is the Big Take DC Podcast. I'm Salaia Moosen
today on the show inside the latest efforts to end
the war between Russia and Ukraine and what Washington's policy
(02:26):
pivot could mean for America's role as a superpower on
the global stage. Last Wednesday, President Trump got on the
phone with Russian President Vladimir Putin. It was the first
publicly announced contact between Putin and a US president since
(02:47):
Russia launched a full scale invasion of Ukraine in February
twenty twenty two.
Speaker 1 (02:51):
We had a great call, and it lasted for a
long time, over an hour. The frenzy and pace at
which the US and the Trump administration now is engaging
on foreign policy and engaging in ways that are very
disruptive and very new and are one hundred and eighty
degrees different than what the Biden administration was doing. I
(03:14):
think that's got a lot of people discombobulated.
Speaker 2 (03:18):
During the Biden administration, the US refused to engage with
Russia on the war in Ukraine, and as Bloomberg's Ian
Marlow says, that's in part because Russia hadn't shown signs
that it was serious about wanting to end it. Putin
has sunk enormous resources into achieving his goal of claiming
Ukraine as part of Russia.
Speaker 1 (03:36):
The Biden administration thought it would be pointless that Putin
was not interested in coming to peace with Ukraine, that
he wanted to subjugate Ukraine. That's why people think this
negotiation process that the Trump administration is trying to launch
is so fraught with risk.
Speaker 2 (03:55):
Trump is gaming out an approach that he'd touted on
the campaign trail for months last year, getting on the
phone and striking a deal. But his move flew in
the face of a US approach that had centered on
Ukrainian involvement and cooperation with European allies.
Speaker 1 (04:10):
Plus, the US wants to basically wind down military and
other humanitarian financial aid to Ukraine because they don't think
the US taxpayer is going to support it for much longer.
Speaker 2 (04:25):
Trump's Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said as much. The same
day that Trump spoke to Putin. Hegseth addressed NATO allies
and Brussels and told them the burden of supporting Ukraine
was going to fall on them.
Speaker 3 (04:37):
Europe must provide the overwhelming share of future lethal and
non lethal aid to Ukraine.
Speaker 2 (04:44):
Bloomberg Economics is estimated that protecting Ukraine and expanding militaries
across Europe could cost the continent's major powers an additional
three point one trillion dollars over the next decade. Hegseth
also made waves by hinting at some of the concessions
the US might be willing to make and ordered to
broker peace between Russia and Ukraine.
Speaker 1 (05:04):
Which was unlikely that Ukraine would hold onto all its territory,
unlikely that it's going to be a member of NATO.
Those are kind of Russian goals for this, and a
lot of people were criticizing Hexath for sort of giving
up some of that leverage before the talks had even begun.
Speaker 2 (05:22):
Two days after Hegseth's comments, leaders from around the world
convene at the Munich Security Conference to discuss the most
pressing diplomatic and security issues.
Speaker 1 (05:32):
Munich was a really eye opening experience for people in
Europe because of what it said about the Transatlantic Alliance.
Speaker 2 (05:41):
Vice President J. D. Vance took the podium on the
first day.
Speaker 1 (05:44):
And basically excoriated European leaders and governments for being sort
of old world liberal elite society that was suppressing right
wing speech.
Speaker 3 (05:57):
What I worry about is the threat from within, the
retreat of Europe from some of its most fundamental values,
values shared with the United States of America.
Speaker 2 (06:09):
That same day, Van sat down with Zelensky in Munich.
Zelensky said he was looking forward to more meetings about
how to end the war.
Speaker 3 (06:17):
Really will want this very much, but we need real
security guarantees.
Speaker 2 (06:22):
And then on Tuesday, a last minute meeting was held
in Saudi Arabia, top US and Russian officials, including Secretary
of State Marco Rubio and his Russian counterpart Sergei Lavrov,
sat down for over four hours without any European allies
and without Ukraine.
Speaker 1 (06:39):
The US has been careful to not characterize these as
a negotiation, in that the US is sitting down at
the table with the Russians and hammering out Ukraine's future
without Ukraine. It is a balancing act that the Biden
administration tried to strike, trying not to lead Ukraine along
(07:00):
too much, but trying to support them and trying to
let Ukraine lead the process. And one outcome of that
was basically that the US took a back seat and said,
you know nothing about Ukraine without Ukraine.
Speaker 2 (07:14):
That made this week's meeting novel because it left Ukraine
out of the room.
Speaker 1 (07:18):
It's not clear at the moment on the US side
who made that decision. I think they feel that after
several years of talking with Ukraine and hearing from their leaders,
they have a fairly good idea what Ukraine wants out
of this. They want their land back. They want the
(07:40):
war to end, but they don't want it to end
on terms that would prevent Ukraine from becoming part of NATO,
becoming part of the EU, or giving up any of
its sovereign rights.
Speaker 2 (07:54):
As for Ukraine's Zelenski.
Speaker 1 (07:56):
He wasn't invited.
Speaker 2 (07:57):
Coincidentally, Zelenski had plans to be in Saudi Arabia that day.
Speaker 1 (08:02):
And he canceled his trip, and he was fairly angry
in his comments. He looks like he's getting cut out
of the process right now. The pace at which the
Trump administration has been willing to toss out the USU
relationship to some degree and make this in some ways
unprecedented outreach to Russia over the head of the EU
(08:25):
and to start engaging in some kind of talks that
we saw here in Saudi Arabia without Europe, without Ukraine,
that this is deeply shocking, and I think a lot
of people in Europe are worried that the US is
willing to sell out Ukraine to some degree in terms
of letting them give up territory or other things to
(08:46):
try and get a deal to try and end the war,
because that would be a big diplomatic coup to some
degree for Trump.
Speaker 2 (08:55):
Coming up inside the room, were US and Russian officials
met this week and where the talks could go from here.
Bloomberg reporter Ian Marlow was in Saudi Arabia for the
landmarks sit down between US and Russian officials on Tuesday.
Speaker 1 (09:18):
The talks were held at one of the Saudi palaces,
the Dria Palace, sort of marble floors, ornate chandeliers. There
was a big formal meeting room where we were kind
of ushered in.
Speaker 2 (09:30):
On the US side, Secretary of State Mark or Rubio,
National Security Advisor Mike Waltz, Middle East Envoice Steve Whitkoff,
and on the Russian side, diplomats like Foreign Minister Sergei
Lavrov and Foreign Policy aid Yuri Ushikov.
Speaker 1 (09:45):
No one was looking happy in the room. These are
serious things to discuss, and I think the US side
knows to some degree that they're taking a chance here,
and on the Russian side of the table too, decades
of diplomatic experience, longtime Kremlin aides who have seen these
things come and go. And on the US side it
is a new US administration kind of bucking protocol to
(10:10):
some degree by launching these talks. It is a different
vibe on both sides of the table. But the US
side was almost constantly on the back foot to some
degree because the Russians kept leaking stuff to their delegation
and their reporters that came with them, and so the
news was always to some degree coming out of the
Russian side, and so they were really sort of framing
(10:33):
the narrative and the Russians feel like they have the
upper hand on the battlefield. It kind of looked and
felt like they might have had the upper hand coming
into these talks, just because they weren't the ones who
asked for them. Basically, this is kind of Trump wanting
to end the war. Putin appears to be quite happy
waging this war and doesn't seem in any rush to stop.
Speaker 2 (10:55):
Russian and US officials spoke for over four hours, setting
the stage for continue conversations.
Speaker 1 (11:01):
These talks have resulted in more talks, which is kind
of a classic diplomatic deliverable. You agree to keep talking
and it looks like you accomplish something other than that.
There wasn't too much concrete that came out of this
other than maybe beefing up embassy staffing for the Russians
(11:21):
in DC and for the US in Moscow and trying
to re engage and to kind of carry.
Speaker 2 (11:28):
This forward still. Ian says, given the years of diplomatic
freeze between the two countries, these talks were significant and
they sent a signal to the rest of the world
that the US isn't bound by historical alliances. On Monday,
EU member states met to work on a plan to
amp up military support for Ukraine. If financed by debt,
that could add an additional two point seven trillion dollars
(11:51):
to the borrowing needs of the five largest European NATO
members over the next decade. That's according to Bloomberg Economics.
As we heard toward the anniversary of the war, Ian says,
there are a few key questions. At the top of
his mind.
Speaker 1 (12:05):
Is the US willing to push Russia when it comes
to these negotiations. Are there going to be any Russian concessions?
What is the US willing to do to turn up
the pressure to bring them to the table. And also
we're going to be looking to see if there's a
Trump putin summit, which would then have a whole bunch
of pageantry and need to entail some kind of deliverables
on either side, Presumably.
Speaker 2 (12:27):
This week, a US special envoy visited Kiev to continue
consultations with Ukraine about ending the war. On Wednesday, amid
a bitter back and forth between the two leaders, Zelensky
accused Trump of being a victim of Russian disinformation and
looking ahead. On Sunday, German citizens will go to the
polls to elect a new government. That election could shape
(12:49):
the approach one of NATO's largest member countries takes to
the conflict. This is The Big Take DC from Bloomberg News.
I'm Salamosen. This episode was produced by Julia Press. It
was edited by Aaron Edwards, Greg White, and Larry Liebert.
(13:10):
It was mixed by Alex Sugia and fact checked by
adrian A. Tapia. Our senior producer is Naomi Shaven. Our
senior editor is Elizabeth Ponso. Our executive producer is Nicolebeamster Bower,
and Sage Bauman is Bloomberg's head of Podcasts. If you
like this episode, make sure to subscribe and review The
Big Take DC wherever you listen to podcasts. It helps
(13:30):
people find the show. Thanks for listening. We'll be back
next week.
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