Trump: Ukraine war would have ended in one day if not for a 'terrible mistake'

Trump said the war should have ended very quickly because Russian President Vladimir Putin had hundreds of tanks moving toward Kyiv along a highway.

"There's a highway, concrete, very good highway, solid as a rock, right into Kyiv. And about halfway there, he would've been there in three hours going at 51 miles an hour, which is about the max speed for a tank," the President said.

However, according to Trump, that did not happen because a Russian general decided to send the tanks "through the farmland" instead. The vehicles became stuck in the mud after record rainfall had hit the area several days earlier.

The American leader said Ukrainian forces then destroyed the Russian tanks using Javelin anti-tank missiles, which he emphasized had been supplied to Kyiv during his presidency.

"They were locked in quicksand, practically. It was mud like quicksand. They couldn't move," Trump said.

According to the US President, if the Russian tanks had stayed on the highway to Kyiv, they would have reached the Ukrainian capital within four hours.

"That war would've been over in one day. That was four and a half years ago. So that was a terrible mistake. And here's a general, decides rather than going up the middle of a highway right into the town," Trump said.

As previously reported, following a Ukrainian strike on the Moscow oil refinery, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy called on Russian citizens to influence the Kremlin leader if they want to end the consequences of the war started by Moscow.

Zelenskyy also noted that, according to available information, more than half of Russians support ending the war. At the same time, he stressed that the Russian public is aware of the lack of significant battlefield achievements by Russian forces.