Photo: Evan Vucci/AP
Photo: Evan Vucci/AP

Ideas

Why Trump Changed His Mind on Ukraine

And why he still might change it again

First published in The Atlantic on September 23, 2025.

by Tom Nichols, The Atlantic
September 24, 2025 | reading time: 5 Min.

Today, President Donald Trump threw one of the most important tenets of his own foreign policy into a 180-degree turn, reversing course without even slowing down. Trump has always been overly deferential to Vladimir Putin, including enabling the Russian president’s war in Ukraine. Now Trump appears to be signaling that he’s fed up with the Kremlin. But is he?

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