President-elect Donald Trump is likely to succeed in efforts to end Russia’s long-running war with Ukraine, although it will likely put kyiv and its European NATO allies on the back foot, Czech President Petr Pavel said .

Trump has repeatedly said he would end more than two and a half years of war in Ukraine “within 24 hours” if returned to the White House. He did not reveal how he hoped to quickly end Europe’s biggest land war since World War II.

“I don’t think it’s realistic, but at the same time I believe he will make an effort to end this war and reach an agreement with President (Vladimir) Putin,” said Pavel, a retired general. and former Chairman of the Board of Directors. of the NATO military committee.

“It will probably not be in our or Ukraine’s interests to reach such an agreement,” Pavel said Friday at the IISS defense summit in Prague.

The president-elect’s advisers have signaled that a future deal could cede parts of Russia-controlled Ukraine to Moscow, delaying kyiv’s NATO membership by at least two decades and handing Europe over long-term responsibility for protecting the eastern flank of the continent. and hundreds of kilometers of demilitarized territory, Pavel said.

The president-elect has not yet decided how to get the Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky and Putin at the same negotiating table, the The Wall Street Journal reported earlier this week.

The future 47th president said in the run-up to the election that he had a “very demanding plan on how to stop Ukraine and Russia,” but stopped short of providing details on the road map aimed at ending the conflict. The Kremlin said it was not aware of any possible plans drawn up by Trump, but that Putin was “open to constructive dialogue.”

“Let’s wait and see what happens in January,” Kremlin spokesperson said Dmitry Peskov told reporters Wednesday.

A popular idea among officials in the Trump camp could see Ukraine pledging not to join NATO for at least 20 years, while Washington continues to send weapons, the Newspaper ” reported, citing three people close to Trump and echoing Pavel’s remarks.

The conflict would also be frozen, with Russia retaining control of about a fifth of Ukraine and a demilitarized zone snaking across the country, likely patrolled by European forces.

“We can offer training and other support, but the barrel of the gun will be European,” a member of Trump’s team said at the news conference. Newspaper. “We are not sending American men and women to keep the peace in Ukraine. And we are not paying for it. Ask the Poles, the Germans, the British and the French to do it.”

“Trump kept saying he could solve the problem in a day,” said the former NATO official Edward Hunter Christie. “No one believes this is possible, it’s rhetoric,” he previously said. News week. But there are fears that Trump could strike a deal with Putin that would put Ukraine and its other allies in “enormous difficulties,” he added.

Former Russian president Dmitry Medvedevwho remains a prominent and hawkish figure in Russian politics, said the Republican was a “businessman at heart”, describing this as a “quality that serves us well”.

Concerns were high for kyiv and many Ukraine supporters ahead of the election, fearing what Trump’s return to power could mean for Ukrainian forces at a time in the war when they are gradually losing ground to Russia in ballast.

Kyiv relies heavily on its supporters for its military supplies. Trump has said he could end military aid to Ukraine if re-elected.

Hungarian Prime Minister and Trump ally in Europe Viktor Orbán said Friday that “the Americans will withdraw from this war.” European officials insist that continental NATO states must and will increase their defense spending, but it is unclear whether Europe would be able to supply kyiv without the U.S. contribution .

NATO members are expected to spend around 2% of their gross domestic product (GDP) on defense. However, this is not binding and several countries have not reached this threshold, although new measures taken in recent years have enabled many of them to reach the target.

Regardless of the presidential victory, Pavel said, European NATO countries will still have to do more to strengthen their own defense. “With President Trump, we will probably have to act more quickly,” Pavel added.

Trump praised his “very good relationship” with the Russian president, while insisting he has good communications with Ukrainian leader Zelensky.

Visiting Budapest on Thursday, Zelensky said he believed Trump “really wants a quick decision” to end the war, but that “doesn’t mean it’s going to happen that way.”