Trump excuses Russian ‘mistake’ as Putin digs in for deeper, longer war

A Russian missile strike kills 35 civilians in the Ukrainian city of Sumy on Palm Sunday. The world watches in horror. The US president calls it a “mistake”.

That single word – mistake – used by Donald Trump to describe Russia’s deadliest missile attack is likely doing far more damage than any diplomatic blunder. It offers a glimpse into a worldview that dangerously blurs the lines between perpetrator and victim, fact and fiction, aggression and accident.

And if that wasn’t disorienting enough, Trump went further. “Millions of people are dead because of three people,” he said. Not just Vladimir Putin but also Joe Biden and Volodymyr Zelensky. In that order.

Putin and Trump in 2019. Credit: AP

To equate the man who ordered the invasion, the former US leader who tried to repel it, and the attacked country’s president tasked with navigating global support is more than an eyebrow-raising moment of rhetorical carelessness. It’s a strategic gift to the Kremlin, one likely to be replayed on Russian state TV as validation that America is as culpable as Moscow.

Indeed, Trump went back to an earlier position of blaming Zelensky entirely: “When you start a war, you’ve got to know you can win the war,” he said when asked about the Ukrainian leader while in a meeting with the president of El Salvador in the Oval Office on Tuesday (AEST).

“You don’t start a war against somebody that’s 20 times your size and then hope that people give you some missiles.”

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky.Credit: Bloomberg

The comments came just a day after the double ballistic missile strike on Palm Sunday – when Ukrainians had gathered to mark a sacred moment in their calendar. It was no coincidence. Just like the April 4 attack on Kryvyi Rih, which killed 19 and wounded 80, it was part of a deliberate Russian strategy to terrorise civilians and shatter morale. These are not misfires. They are the playbook.

For 34 days now, Russia has been openly refusing to sign up to a ceasefire of any description. There was no confusion about it in Brussels last week. No hedging. No false equivalence. Just a stark reality laid bare by a senior NATO official to select journalists: “I don’t see any signs whatsoever that the Russians are preparing for a ceasefire.”

If anything, Putin is gearing up for a deeper, longer war. He’s betting Trump will blink first.

According to NATO intelligence, Russia is using the lull in Western aid and growing political fractures in the US to recalibrate – to stockpile weapons, ramp up production, and build out a war economy sustained by authoritarian alliances.

“Russia can continue to use time to its advantage,” the official warned. And it is. On the battlefield, Ukraine remains outgunned and under-resourced.

The network behind Putin’s war effort now stretches from Pyongyang to Tehran, from Beijing to Minsk. North Korea has become an unlikely – and bloody – partner. Since January, Pyongyang has sent 3500 more troops to join the fight in Kursk, bringing the total to 11,000. These are not support staff. They are fighting. And dying.

“Ukraine has reported that North Korea delivered 148 missiles last year,” the NATO official added, “and they’ve committed to delivering 150 in 2025.”

Iran is also in deep. Its Shahed drones have become a regular presence in Ukrainian skies. At least four shipments of Fath-360 ballistic missiles have been confirmed. While these don’t shift battlefield dynamics, they allow Russia to conserve its arsenal – a kind of battlefield buffering system, keeping the Kremlin’s stocks intact for future offensives.

But the most insidious support may be coming from China – not in bombs, but in bolts. Since 2023, Russia has purchased more than $US18.2 billion ($28.7 billion) of manufacturing tools and components from Chinese suppliers.

Body bags lie on the ground after the Russian missile strike on Sumy, Ukraine, on Palm Sunday. Western officials say the attack was not a mistake.Credit: AP

“Russia’s defence industry consumes roughly 70 per cent of all machine tools in the country,” the NATO official said. And many of those come through loopholes – Western-designed tech rerouted via Chinese subsidiaries, circumventing sanctions.

This partnership is allowing Russia to do what many thought it couldn’t: rebuild, rearm and retool.

The question of how long Kyiv can hold out without renewed US support hangs like smoke over NATO’s strategic assessments. When asked, the senior official didn’t hesitate – or reassure: “I don’t have a good assessment of that.”

“Peace to the world” by Russian artist Alexei Sergienko, showing a combination of faces Putin and Trump.Credit: AP

Yes, Europe is increasing defence spending. Billions of euros have been redirected toward security, weapons and ammunition. But without American leadership, trans-Atlantic unity begins to crack – and the Kremlin knows it.

Putin is not tired. He is not looking for the exit ramp. “160,000 conscripts this spring,” the NATO official said – evidence of doubling down, not retreating. Russia isn’t interested in a ceasefire. It’s preparing for another push.

Meanwhile, the human cost, which Trump keeps talking about, keeps climbing. Russia has suffered more than 900,000 casualties since the war began. In March alone, 1255 Russians were killed or wounded every day.

Despite Trump’s efforts to open direct negotiations with Russia, the Kremlin’s long-term strategy hasn’t changed.

“We continue to doubt that Putin’s team is coming to the table with good intent,” the NATO official said.

This war will only stop when the Kremlin calculates that the cost of continuing – militarily, economically, and politically – is too high. Until then, the West faces a simple, stark choice: stand firm behind Ukraine or begin preparing for the consequences of its collapse.

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