Trump blames Zelenskyy for diesel costs, ignoring his own policy

By Klaus Berger · Reporting from Frankfurt · September 14, 2026

There is a particular brand of magical thinking that treats the global energy market as a series of light switches that can be flipped by a single phone call.

The Arithmetic of Denial

President Donald Trump said during an official visit to Ireland that Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy must stop "knocking out diesel fuel in Russia," claiming these strikes "hurt the world." Trump’s frustration stems from a visceral domestic reality: U.S. diesel prices hit a record average of $6.06 a gallon last Friday, CNBC reported.

For the American trucker or farmer paying nearly two-thirds more for fuel than last year, the culprit seems obvious. But Trump’s claim that the crisis "isn't done by the Middle East" ignores the ledger. According to the Kyiv Independent, Trump’s own campaign against Iran destroyed one-fifth of Middle Eastern refining capacity and effectively shuttered the Strait of Hormuz, a narrow bottleneck between Oman and Iran that once carried 20% of the world's oil.

Blaming Ukrainian drones at the TANECO refinery in Tatarstan for a global shortage is like blaming a leaky faucet for a flood while the dam has burst. The laws of supply and demand do not bend to the "art of the deal." You cannot block the world's primary oil artery and then point to a few burning tanks in the Russian interior to explain the price spike.

Why the Russian Argument Fails

This volatility mirrors the 1973 oil crisis. Then, the Organization of Arab Petroleum Exporting Countries (OAPEC) choked off energy flows to force political concessions, a move that shattered global economic stability and left drivers in long lines at gas stations. Today, the disruption is not a single lever flipped by one regime, but a chaotic, multi-polar scramble for remaining barrels.

Supporters of the President argue that because Russia is the world’s second-largest diesel exporter, any hit to its refineries triggers the shortage. They point to Moscow's decision to extend its diesel export ban through September, a move intended to keep Russian gas stations running while the military consumes the surplus.

This logic ignores the baseline. Vortexa found that Russian diesel exports in August dropped to less than one-fifth of their five-year average. The Russian system is not leaking; it has evaporated. When Brent crude futures climb toward $107 and WTI tops $100, the market is pricing in the loss of the Persian Gulf, not a few damaged facilities in Krasnodar Krai where drones have turned refining towers into pillars of black smoke.

This impulse to demand immediate stabilization recalls the 2022 fuel crisis, when leaders chased "quick fixes" for a tectonic geopolitical shift. Security is a result of policy, not a stroke of luck, and it cannot be restored by asking a besieged nation to protect the factories and pipelines of the army invading it.

A Dangerous Trade-off

Ukraine has struck Russian oil facilities more than 300 times since 2022. For Kyiv, these drones are not mere symbols; they degrade the tanks, trucks, and missiles of the Russian war machine, starving the front lines of the fuel needed for armored breakthroughs. For Trump, they are a political liability. By demanding Zelenskyy stop the strikes, Trump attempts to shift the cost of his Iranian strategy onto the Ukrainian military.

This creates a perilous incentive. If the administration cuts shipments of artillery shells or reduces military aid to force compliance, it signals that keeping gas cheap is more important than Ukrainian sovereignty. It suggests that the U.S. will prioritize the integrity of Russian refineries over the survival of a democratic ally.

A collision has occurred between the requirements of total war and the deadlines of an election. The President treats a systemic energy collapse as a nuisance to be solved by editing the target list of the Security Service of Ukraine. He is attempting to negotiate with the laws of physics.

History shows that when energy becomes a weapon, selective blindness does not cure the instability. You cannot ignore the shuttered waterways of the Gulf and expect the numbers to add up. Trump is not fighting a diesel shortage; he is fighting the math of his own foreign policy. The market will prove a harsher judge than any voter.

Trump blames Zelenskyy for diesel costs, ignoring his own policy

The Arithmetic of Denial

Why the Russian Argument Fails

A Dangerous Trade-off

Sources