Trump would not be ‘capable’ of holding Ukraine-Russia peace talks, says his former national security adviser John Bolton

• Trump would not be “capable” of holding Ukraine-Russia peace talks if he was still president, John Bolton said. 
• “That’s just not what he does,” said Bolton of his former boss, he told The Palm Beach Post.
• Bolton served as Trump’s national security adviser from 2018 to 2019.

Former President Donald Trump would not be “capable” of holding peace talks in Moscow between Ukraine and Russia to stop the ongoing war, said John Bolton on Saturday.

Bolton, who served as Trump’s national security adviser from 2018 to 2019, said that such statesmanship would be out of Trump’s character.

“He’s not capable of it,” Bolton told The Palm Beach Post. “This would require thinking through a policy and considering the pluses and minuses, the risks and costs involved. That’s just not what he does.”

Last Saturday, Trump said his personality kept the US out of war and added that Russian President Vladimir Putin would not have invaded Ukraine if he were still in office. 

The former president has repeatedly asserted that the ongoing war would not be happening if he was still in charge, Insider Lauren Frias and Sonam Sheth reported.

Bolton previously told The Washington Post that the only reason Putin didn’t invade Ukraine during Trump’s presidency is that he would’ve withdrawn the United States from the NATO alliance in his second term. 

“In a second Trump term, I think he may well have withdrawn from NATO,” Bolton said, per the newspaper. “And I think Putin was waiting for that.”

In his interview with The Palm Beach Post, Bolton reiterated his belief that Trump’s objective was to “withdraw the U.S. from NATO or substantially limit” Washington’s support for the defensive alliance.

“He was very negative on the institution,” Bolton added. 

Bolton also told the local newspaper that Trump would have gifted Russia Ukraine had had won a second term as president.

Speaking to British radio station LBC last week, Bolton offered a negative assessment of how his former boss would have fared in this conflict. “If Trump had been re-elected, Putin would be in Kyiv already,” he said.