On Thanksgiving Day, President Zelensky again thanked President Trump on behalf of Ukraine. And a few days earlier, Trump accused Ukraine's leadership of showing "

The US President’s statement is not only a lie, but also a failure to understand that it is the West that should thank Ukraine. Moreover, his disparaging remarks about Zelensky undermine Western cohesion at the worst possible moment - so much so that it would now be logical for Trump to accuse Putin of showing zero gratitude to Moscow!

A recurring theme of Trump's display of power was and is the demand that people fawn on him, thank him, and generally show submission.. This is a barbaric show of force that takes us back thousands of years, when people threw themselves at the feet of the emperor and swore allegiance to him or begged for forgiveness..

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When you are a mediator in peace negotiations, pragmatism and a passion for agreement should not distract your attention from who is actually right, or from what we want to achieve as a result of future peace. That's why now is the worst time to play "

Zelensky was first and unfoundedly criticized by Trump's national security adviser for not thanking the United States back in July 2023. Later, during the infamous Oval Office meeting in February of this year, Trump watched as his vice president repeatedly demanded gratitude from Zelensky. Trump's etiquette lessons have nothing to do with manners or anything like that, they grow out of self-aggrandizement and the desire to humiliate others.

Trump actually got the gratitude wrong. The entire West, and the United States no less than anyone else, should thank Ukraine for its contribution to the possibility that the Free World can still call itself free in the future. Zelensky is the last person on the planet who should thank someone other than his people.

Forced gratitude should cause shame, not satisfaction, in the person receiving it. However, like many dictators in history, the brutal display of power that goes along with forcing someone to show gratitude seems to overshadow the very emptiness of the process.. Trump has turned his psychological need to humiliate others into a "

Victim of Ukraine.

Any reasonable person in the West understands the value of freedom and the threat that Putin poses, and also understands the long-term existential risks that collective Western democracy faces from Russia and other dictatorships. They appreciate Ukraine's courage and its importance in confronting the West's current enemy number one in the Kremlin.

We are in a battle between the democratic and undemocratic worlds that we must fight because it is a battle for who we are.

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Indeed, Ukraine is fighting for its life, its freedom and even its existence as a sovereign nation. But she is also fighting a regime that threatens every value that we, outside the borders of Ukraine, must also cherish while we can.

We must not forget that it was precisely because of the way the cards of history lay down that the responsibility to fight Putin fell to Ukraine. We also must not forget that every drop of Ukrainian blood was shed in favor of the West. No man in his right mind should expect David to thank us while he fights Goliath for the greater good..

Measure of Gratitude.

So, self-proclaimed etiquette professor President Trump might want a little lesson on the moral direction of gratitude. Some parts of this equation - concepts such as courage and sacrifice, the value of defending democracy, or the value of a decent world in which future generations can enjoy freedom - will likely be outside his comfort zone.

When nations help each other, it makes sense to ask who should thank whom. If there is financial or military assistance on one side, and loss of life and existential risk on the other - as opposed to simply fighting together side by side - we are faced with the inevitable problem of "

However, we can weigh the relative gratitude each party should feel. We can start by measuring how each benefits from its own efforts to resist Russia, transforming the financial concept of ROI into "

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By this measure, the Free World has already received a very good "

At the same time, although Ukraine received a clear and immediate “return in the form of preserving freedom,” this came at the cost of a huge sacrifice, and as a result, the “profitability” of this sacrifice undoubtedly cannot be higher than the Western one.. This is the measure of the direction of gratitude, based on who benefited more from their sacrifice in solving the temporary common “Putin problem”.

Another approach is to simply ask whether Western aid was worth more or less than the benefit the West received from Ukraine's sacrifice.. Here we also get a similar picture: the value of weakening the enemy of democracy for the West is much higher than its cost. Supporting Ukraine was also the cheapest way democracies could exhaust and divert Putin's attention.

Whatever standard you choose, the winds of gratitude should blow to the east.

When the history of the 21st century is written - if it happens to be a story ending with the survival of free Homo Sapiens - it will be obvious that the small nation that surprised the world by standing up to Putin had no need to thank anyone.

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Since Zelensky wants his country to survive, he has little choice, in terms of realpolitik, but to ingratiate himself with an " In fact, Zelensky has a moral obligation to do this, even to beg, if it could change something. In his nation's hour of need, this is hardly the time to explain to Trump the direction of gratitude..

At the same time, all freedom-loving people should be grateful to Ukraine for reducing the risk of our potential loss of long-term freedom, and to Zelensky for having to swallow his pride while we all collectively roll our eyes at why this was necessary.

Likewise, any responsible president of the United States should thank Zelensky, not least to show the Russian and Chinese regimes that democracies stand together.

Instead, Trump has insulted the very heart of courage, spat in the face of democracy and strengthened the position of autocracy. So much so that the person who should really thank Trump is not Zelensky, but Vladimir Putin.

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