Wesley Clark, former NATO supreme allied commander, told Newsmax on Tuesday that Russian President Vladimir Putin must be convinced that "he cannot win" before he will withdraw from Ukraine.
Allies of President-elect Donald Trump this week sent peace proposals to Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, who rejected their suggestions for ending the invasion of Ukraine.
Clark, in an interview with "American Agenda," said that he hopes Trump will be successful in negotiating an end to the war in Ukraine, but he added that we "have to expect that President Putin is going to play very, very tough on this."
He added that Putin has "been very clear on his objectives really since the time I was NATO commander. He always has wanted to restore the Soviet Union's space. So that means regaining the Baltic states, all of Ukraine, Moldova, Georgia, etc. And this is the objective. And he's laid it out very clearly in writing. So I don't see a halfway step here producing much."
Clark noted that he holds "a lot of respect for Gen. Keith Kellogg, whom President Trump has appointed to go over there and do this. But already the points that Gen. Kellogg presented have been rejected summarily without even any personal discussion. So it's really hard to see where this is going to go."
The former NATO commander said that Putin won't "easily give in unless he thinks he cannot win. And unfortunately, from the very beginning, the Biden administration has made it clear that there are certain things that we won't do to convince Putin of this."
Clark said that the Biden administration failed to cut off Putin's personal finances or "stop the outflow of Russian oil."
He added that the U.S. isn't providing "the Ukrainians what they need militarily to successfully defend and regain their territory."
Clark said the U.S. "put so many obstacles in the way of convincing Putin that he can't win, that he thinks he's going to win. All he has to do is hang on."
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Theodore Bunker ✉
Theodore Bunker, a Newsmax writer, has more than a decade covering news, media, and politics.
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