WASHINGTON — President Trump’s dramatic pronouncement Tuesday that Russia is a “paper tiger” is based on new US intelligence that shows the Kremlin is spiraling toward economic ruin and battlefield defeat as a result of its invasion of Ukraine.
Meanwhile, Trump’s insistence in the same statement that Ukraine can regain all the land currently occupied by Russia is the president’s latest “strategic move” to try and bring Russia to the negotiating table, sources inside and outside the White House told The Post Wednesday.
Despite months of administration efforts and Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelensky’s stated willingness to pursue peace talks, Russian leader Vladimir Putin has shown no interest in any truce — shunning overtures by Washington and Kyiv as his forces continue to strike civilian targets.
In a lengthy post on Truth Social after meeting Zelensky on the sidelines of the United Nations General Assembly, Trump warned that once the Russian people “find out what is really going on with this war” economically, “Ukraine would be able to take back their Country in its original form and, who knows, maybe even go further than that!”
Asked Wednesday whether the message by Trump was a “strategic move aimed at stirring up negotiations,” a White House official responded: “Yes, that is correct.”
“It doesn’t signal any substantive policy change,” affirmed a source close to the administration. “It’s a clear and obvious negotiating tactic to push Russia.”
However, the president’s statement was also based on fresh information detailing Moscow’s military and financial struggles, according to a source familiar with discussions.
“The president of United States is a person who will listen, but he needs to check, to compare, to speak with many people, and for me, this is absolutely normal,” top Zelensky adviser Andriy Yermak said in an interview Tuesday. “It’s our job as [the] team of our leaders, to speak, to consult, to repeat, to give the evidence, to exchange the information.”
Both Yermak and Zelensky himself stated Tuesday that Trump is coming to realize that Putin’s claims of total superiority on the battlefield are “fairy tales.”
According to the Institute for the Study of War (ISW), Russia has gained very little land for the number of casualties its forces have taken in recent months.
Moscow’s forces have advanced a total of 1,910.39 square kilometers (737.6 square miles) inside Ukraine between May and August if this year, while suffering 130,160 killed and wounded in the same time frame, an “extremely heavy casualty rate” by ISW’s definition.
“I think he knows more details than before, and I’m happy with this and I’m thankful for him and also maybe for the people who briefed him,” Zelensky said of Trump during a Tuesday news conference.
Russia’s economic decline, meanwhile, is due to both declining oil revenues and the using up of so-called “free resources,” like liquid assets from its National Welfare Fund.
In August of this year, for example, Russian oil export revenues declined to $13.5 billion from $14.4 billion the previous month, according to the International Energy Agency.
Over the first eight months of this year, the value of Moscow’s oil exports reached $110.6 billion, a decline of 16% from the same period in 2024.
Meanwhile, Russia’s Finance Ministry proposed raising the country’s value-added tax (VAT) two percentage points to 22% Wednesday and revised its projected economic growth for this year to 1% compared to 4.3% in 2024.
Ordinary Russians are also being forced to grapple with gas shortages as a result of long-range Ukrainian drone strikes on refineries, revealed Mark Montgomery, a retired Navy rear admiral and senor fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies.
“As his [Putin’s] economy becomes pressurized,” Montgomery suggested, “he has to pick between paying for the war machine or paying for — or maybe payments to — the people who have given him a solid majority in his country.”
“The president is making it very clear that Russia is in a very weak position,” White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt told Fox News’ Jessie Watters Tuesday night.
“And he’s absolutely right. They are a massive country with a massive military. They are a war economy. But it’s been three-and-a-half years and look at how Ukraine has been able to defend itself,” she added.
“If the Russians refuse to negotiate in good faith, I think it’s going to be very, very bad for their country,” Vice President JD Vance agreed Wednesday.
“That’s what the President made clear. It’s not a shift in position. It’s an acknowledgement of the reality on the ground.”
