End the War (by Surrendering)

Yesterday's Times headline was brilliant!

So, according to Trump, Putin wants to “end the war” in Ukraine – much like Hitler wanted to “end the war” against Poland in 1939. That is to say, by winning it. The logic is almost beautiful in its simplicity, if you ignore the piles of corpses and the wholesale destruction. When an invader smashes into another country, flattens cities, massacres civilians, and then declares, “Well, I’d like this all to be over now,” what they really mean is: “I’d like you to surrender so I can have what I came for.”

If Putin genuinely wanted to end the war, he could do so this afternoon by packing up his tanks and slithering back across the border. But that’s not what he means. He means he wants to end it on his terms – which is to say, by carving up Ukraine, installing a puppet regime, and pretending none of this ever happened.

It’s the same grim farce we saw in 1939. Hitler didn’t really want a “war” with Poland, in the sense of prolonged fighting. He wanted Poland, full stop. The war was an unfortunate obstacle to that goal, but once the Poles were suitably crushed and occupied, Hitler could magnanimously declare an end to hostilities – an act of peace, you see. The fact that this was done via Blitzkrieg, massacres, and forced deportations was just an unfortunate necessity.

Trump, being the moral vacuum he is, sees no issue with this. In his mind, Putin is simply doing what any strongman would do – taking what he wants, crushing the opposition, and demanding applause for stopping when he’s had his fill. The idea that Ukraine, like Poland before it, might have its own agency, its own right to exist without being torn to pieces by a deranged imperialist, simply doesn’t compute in the Trumpian worldview. He sees power as the only currency, and might as well be reading Mein Kampf with a highlighter pen.

This, incidentally, is why Trump is a walking diplomatic catastrophe. He doesn’t grasp the concept of sovereignty unless it’s his own. Putin annexing bits of Ukraine? That’s just “smart” – the same way he once called Hitler’s invasion of Russia a “good idea.” There is no morality here, just the transactional mindset of a man who would sell his own mother for the right price and then claim it was a strategic masterstroke.

So here we are again. A brutal dictator wages war, massacres civilians, annexes territory, and then declares, “I’m the reasonable one here – I’d like this to be over.” And useful idiots in the West nod along, either out of ignorance or because they, too, see democracy as a pesky inconvenience. Putin doesn’t want to end the war – he wants to end Ukraine. And if history has taught us anything, it’s that appeasing this kind of madness only invites more destruction.

However, the solution to Ukraine’s woes has been staring us in the face all along – straight out of The Mouse That Roared. Ukraine doesn’t need to beg for NATO membership, suffer through Western dithering, or rely on the charity of nations that still think they can negotiate with a lunatic in the Kremlin. No, Ukraine needs to do what any self-respecting underdog in a satirical 1950s novel would do – invade the United States.

It doesn’t need to be a full-scale invasion. Just a few dozen troops, perhaps a single armoured vehicle, rolling up to the White House gates demanding unconditional surrender. The Secret Service, now used to handling pensioners with poor impulse control, will barely raise an eyebrow. The real stroke of genius, though, comes in Trump’s inevitable response. With all the strategic brilliance of a man who thinks you can nuke hurricanes, he declares victory. Huge victory. Biggest victory ever.

And then – the masterstroke – he annexes Ukraine. Ukraine is America now. Always has been. It’s beautiful. People are saying it’s beautiful. The best real estate deal since we bought Alaska. Smart people love it. Fox News spends a full 48 hours claiming Ukraine was always a U.S. territory, while Elon Musk changes the name of Kyiv to X.

What does this mean? Security guarantees. Article 5 protection. America’s newest and most accidentally acquired state is now entitled to the full force of the U.S. military, which, ironically, is exactly what Ukraine has been asking for all along. All it took was a farcical invasion and the world’s most easily manipulated autocrat. Lindsey Graham, caught in a logical paradox, suddenly demands airstrikes on Moscow.

Of course, it doesn’t stop there. Ukrainians, now technically American citizens, realise they can vote. They hold an election. Zelensky wins in a landslide, replacing Trump as President of the United States. The MAGA crowd, confused and angry, demands a recount, only to realise that Ukrainians actually did win this election fair and square. The Secret Service, fed up with babysitting an orange liability, shrugs and takes orders from a bloke who can string two sentences together.

Meanwhile, Putin, watching his useful idiot get steamrolled, tries the same trick. He declares a Russian invasion of Washington, hoping for similar results. Unfortunately, the convoy gets lost somewhere in Poland, runs out of fuel, and is last seen asking for directions in broken German.

And just like that, Ukraine wins. NATO membership? Sorted. U.S. statehood? Done. Trump exiled? A delightful bonus. The Mouse That Roared – but this time, with Javelins and HIMARS. Beautiful.