Donald Trump's plan for Ukraine is a "disgrace," according to a foreign affairs expert who has won three Pulitzer Prizes.
Thomas L. Friedman, the foreign affairs Opinion columnist for New York Times, skewered the president for his effort to achieve the Nobel Peace Prize.
"Finally, finally, President Trump just might get a peace prize that would secure his place in history. Unfortunately, though, it is not that Nobel peace prize he so covets. It is the 'Neville Chamberlain Peace Prize' — awarded by history to the leader of the country that most flagrantly sells out its allies and its values to an aggressive dictator," he wrote. "This prize richly deserves to be shared by Trump’s many 'secretaries of state' — Steve Witkoff, Marco Rubio and Dan Driscoll — who together negotiated the surrender of Ukraine to Vladimir Putin’s demands without consulting Ukraine or our European allies in advance — and then told Ukraine it had to accept the plan by Thanksgiving." He added, "That is this coming Thursday."
Friedman then says the deal threatens the holiday itself.
"If Ukraine is, indeed, forced to surrender to the specific terms of this 'deal' by then, Thanksgiving will no longer be an American holiday. It will become a Russian holiday," he wrote. "It will become a day of thanks that victory in Putin’s savage and misbegotten war against Ukraine’s people, which has been an utter failure — morally, militarily, diplomatically and economically — was delivered to Russia not by the superiority of its arms or the virtue of its claims, but by an American administration."
The expert went on to say that, "By rewarding Putin’s unprovoked invasion of Ukraine based on his obsession with making it part of Mother Russia, the U.S. will be putting the whole European Union under Putin’s thumb."
"Trump’s message to our allies will be clear: Don’t provoke Putin, because as long as I am commander in chief, the United States will pay no price and we will bear no burden in the defense of your freedom. Which is why, if this plan is forced on Ukraine as is, we will need to add a new verb to the diplomatic lexicon: 'Trumped' — to be sold out by an American president, for reasons none of his citizens understand (but surely there are reasons)," he added. "And history will never forget the men who did it — Donald Trump, Steve Witkoff, Marco Rubio, Dan Driscoll — for their shame will be everlasting."