From saviour to Judas... How Trump's pivot on Russia also endangers his own country

With a Putin-appeasing president at the helm, it is clear the transatlantic alliance is collapsing and European leaders must plot their own course

- Simon Tisdall

How do I betray thee? Let me count the ways... Apologies to Elizabeth Barrett Browning for mangling her celebrated poem to reflect Donald Trump's multiple Ukraine treacheries. This most perfidious of presidents surpassed himself last week, accusing Kyiv of invading itself three years ago tomorrow. "You should have never started it. You could have made a deal," he fatuously griped.

Candidate Trump, touting a just peace, pledged to end the war in a day. Now he praises Vladimir Putin, claims Ukraine's president, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, is "a dictator" and backs a settlement on Moscow's criminal, one-sided terms. This deranged collapse into craven capitulation, this transition from American saviour to American Judas, took less than a month. It's contemptible.

The wider ramifications of Trump's infamy may take years to fully grasp. But its immediate import is plain. For Ukraine's people, daily victims of Putin's aggression, Trump is right up there with Brutus, Benedict Arnold, Vidkun Quisling and Lord Haw-Haw. Tens of thousands of civilians are dead or injured, millions are displaced and homeless. Now they are all Trump's victims, too.

Putin, a dictator in the true sense, launched an unprovoked, full-scale invasion in defiance of common sense, morality and international law. He is committing serial war crimes. Yet he's flattered and excused, and told he can keep what he stole, by his White House gangsta bro. Trump should demand Putin's arrest along with an unconditional end to hostilities. Instead, he plays lickspittle. He's a disgrace to American democracy.