“Trump makes political statements in his election campaign. He says he wants the war to stop. Well, we do, too…. My feeling is that Trump doesn’t really know how to stop the war even if he might think he knows how,” Zelenskyy told The New Yorker in the interview published Sunday, noting that he was appreciative that Trump has expressed his support. “With this war, oftentimes, the deeper you look at it the less you understand. I’ve seen many leaders who were convinced they knew how to end it tomorrow, and as they waded deeper into it, they realized it’s not that simple.”
Zelenskyy was even more critical of Vance to The New Yorker, referring to him as “too radical.” In an
interview with the Shawn Ryan show in mid-September, Vance recently proposed a peace deal where Russia retains the territory it has seized so that a demilitarized zone could be established along the current battle lines.
The demilitarized zone would need to be “heavily fortified so the Russians don’t invade again,” Vance said at the time. Such a deal could also involve the provision that Ukraine doesn’t join NATO to guarantee neutrality with Russia.
“This would be an awful idea, if a person were actually going to carry it out,” Zelenskyy told The New Yorker. “But there’s certainly no way this could ever happen… And it wouldn’t necessarily end the war, either. It’s just sloganeering.”