Shortly after giving Russia a ten-day deadline to stop the war in Ukraine, US President Donald Trump made it clear on July 31 that the United States would "impose sanctions" on Moscow due to the lack of progress towards a ceasefire or peace agreement with Kiev.
At the same time, he said it was unclear whether financial sanctions would push Russian President Vladimir Putin toward a ceasefire and told reporters that his special envoy, Steve Witkoff, would travel to Moscow after a visit to Israel, where he arrived on August 1.
If Trump imposes sanctions on Russia before or after the 10-day deadline, which is set to expire on August 8, it would be the first time he has penalized the Kremlin in more than six months since he began his second term. During the presidential election campaign, Trump had promised to quickly mediate an end to the largest war in Europe since 1945.
The threat of new sanctions comes as Russia advances on the battlefield and pounds Ukrainian cities with airstrikes, including a missile and drone strike that killed at least 31 people — five of them children — in Kiev this week. Trump called the ongoing attacks “disgusting” in a statement on July 31.
Will Witkoff make the difference?
With Trump hinting that sanctions are now inevitable, sending Witkoff to Russia — who has met with Putin several times since January — could be a last-ditch effort to push the Kremlin to move on before the deadline expires.
But the chances of that seem slim, and US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said unannounced talks this week "with some people close to Putin" had made no progress "in reaching an understanding on a way forward that would lead to peace."
Three rounds of direct talks in Istanbul during May and June also failed to bring Russia and Ukraine closer on the key issues that prevent a ceasefire or a comprehensive peace agreement from being reached.
"Russia will not make any more concessions," Prague-based political commentator Ivan Preobrazhensky told Current Time on August 1.
"The Kremlin realized that Trump had found out that he was being deceived. As a result, Moscow is preparing for a breakdown in relations – returning to the format that was about six months ago, during the presidency of Joe Biden."
The other side of the coin: Putin may see Witkoff's visit as an opportunity to convince the White House to back down from its threat of sanctions or change course, placing much of the blame for the lack of progress toward peace on Kiev, as Trump had done until recent weeks, when he began expressing increasing anger toward Russia.
Although Trump has recently directed his criticism at Moscow, he has also emphasized that it takes two sides to reach an agreement, and that Ukraine must do "what needs to be done" to end the war.
"Both sides, both Russia and Ukraine, must negotiate a ceasefire and a lasting peace. The time has come for an agreement," John Kelley, acting US representative to the United Nations, said on July 31.
Although Ukraine has agreed to a ceasefire proposed by Trump, Russia has not. But Moscow may see this as an opportunity to push Washington to pressure Kiev for concessions.
What sanctions, and will they work?
Trump has not said exactly what sanctions he plans to impose, but he has made clear that they could include “very tough tariffs” on Russia itself and, as he said on July 28, “possibly... secondary tariffs” on countries that trade with Moscow.
The first, tariffs on Russia, would have little impact, analysts say, because the volume of U.S.-Russia trade is small. But the secondary tariffs could be much more significant, especially when it comes to oil and gas, Russia’s most profitable exports. In an interview with Fox News Radio, Secretary of State Marco Rubio said that oil exports bring Russia “a huge portion” of its revenue.
However, there are risks: China, India and Turkey are the largest buyers of Russian crude oil and also among the main customers for its refined products. Therefore, secondary tariffs could complicate relations with these countries.
Meanwhile, the benefits of these actions remain uncertain, as the Kremlin is showing no signs of being willing to make concessions, while China seems uninterested in giving up support for Russia's war in Ukraine.
Rubio said President Trump has "many options," including secondary sanctions on Russian oil sales and "sectoral sanctions on the banking system, which would also be very strong."
But, during his statement on July 31, Trump himself downplayed the possibility that punitive measures would convince Putin.
"I don't know if the sanctions bother him," he said.
Will Trump show interest or back down?
Aside from sanctions, a crucial question is whether Trump will continue to show interest in ending Russia's war against Ukraine in the coming months, or will he back down, as he and other US administration officials have repeatedly suggested he might.
At some point, Trump will have to decide "whether it's worth continuing to try to reach a ceasefire if one of the two sides is not interested in it," Rubio said, adding that "it's clear the president is not going to wait indefinitely."
Even before his election to the presidency, Trump had hinted that he could use a combination of sanctions against Russia and support for Kiev, mainly through the supply of arms, to push the two countries towards a peace agreement.
On the issue of weapons for Kiev, it remains unclear how far President Trump is willing to go. On July 14, when he set a 50-day deadline for peace — a deadline he shortened to 10 days this week — he also announced plans to bolster Ukraine’s arsenal, but not through direct arms shipments.
Instead, he mentioned an agreement under which NATO member countries would send existing weapons, such as Patriot missile systems, to Ukraine and then replace them by purchasing new weapons from the US, or simply buy American weapons and send them to Kiev.
But there are questions about how many weapons will reach Ukraine this way in the near future, and how quickly they will be delivered.
Meanwhile, Trump has not yet authorized new arms shipments to Ukraine through a program that was frequently used by his predecessor, Joe Biden, that gives the president the right to send weapons from existing stockpiles. When Trump took office, there were about $4 billion in the Presidential Defense Authorization (PDA).
What will happen on the battlefield?
Ukrainian forces have made little progress on the battlefield since the failure of a major counteroffensive in 2023. Since then, Russia has continued to take additional territory, albeit slowly and at a great cost in human lives.
When Trump set the 50-day deadline on July 14, critics warned that it would give Russia more time to advance even further before facing sanctions or other measures, weakening Kiev's position in any talks about the territories.
The shorter term reduces these concerns, and analysts said that, in any case, Russia does not have the capacity to take over all of what it baselessly claims as its territory – the Ukrainian regions of Donetsk, Luhansk, Zaporizhia and Kherson, in addition to Crimea – in the near future.
So far, however, Russia has shown no sign of backing down from its efforts to advance on the ground, and there is no indication that the July 8 deadline – or the sanctions that will likely follow – will change its approach.
AFP, on August 1, citing research it conducted, reported that Russia launched more drones into Ukraine in July than in any other month since the invasion began in 2022.
That same day, Russian President Vladimir Putin said that Moscow's objectives in this war remain unchanged, while asserting that Russian forces are advancing along the entire front line, despite, as he called it, the West's desire to stop their advance.
"In the coming months, Russia will increase pressure on Ukraine and, of course, will try to launch a new offensive before the cold weather sets in," Ivan Preobrazhensky told Current Time, the Russian-language television network run by Radio Free Europe. REL (A2 Televizion)
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