With Donald Trump’s return to the Oval Office, both the style and underlying philosophy of American foreign policy have undergone significant changes. Compared to its predecessors, the new U.S. administration has shifted priorities and adopted a different rhetoric. Terms like “human rights” and “defending freedom” have been replaced by a considerably more transactional approach. This shift is most evident in Washington’s stance on the Russia-Ukraine war. Instead of Biden’s pledge to support Ukraine “as long as it takes,” the new Trump administration has suspended military aid and intelligence sharing in order to carve out a “peace deal.” Can Ukraine withstand pressure from Trump’s team and survive without U.S. support? What kind of deal is Russia seeking with the United States? What are the possible future scenarios for Ukraine, and how might they impact European security? Is Europe prepared for the challenges of a Trumpian world? During the lecture we will touch upon these questions and try to find answers.

Dr. Igor Gretski has been a research fellow at the International Centre for Defence and Security (ICDS) since July 2022. Before that, he was the second Tallinn Fellow at ICDS. The Tallinn Fellowship aims to strengthen ICDS’s ties with research institutions and think tanks in the Commonwealth of Independent States, as well as in Georgia and Ukraine. Until the spring of 2022, Dr. Gretski also worked as an associate professor at the School of International Relations at Saint Petersburg State University. From 2014 to 2021, he headed the university rectorate’s international office at the Smolny campus. Dr. Gretski primarily researches Russia’s relations with Ukraine and Poland, as well as political transformations in Central and Eastern Europe. His assessments, comments, and analyses on major political developments in the region are frequently covered in the media. He obtained his PhD in the history of international relations and foreign policy in 2009.