President Donald Trump flew to Alaska hoping he could pull a diplomatic rabbit out of his hat. Although he kept his expectations low and described the high-stakes summit with Russian President Vladimir Putin as a way to determine whether Moscow was committed to participating in a serious peace process to end the war in Ukraine, it was clear from the get-go that Trump wanted to leave the meeting with some kind of ceasefire in hand. “I won’t be happy if I walk away without some form of a ceasefire,” Trump told Fox News’ Bret Baier.
If those were Trump’s true feelings, then he must have been sulking on Air Force One as he headed back to Washington, D.C. Trump not only failed to get the immediate, unconditional ceasefire he was pining for, but he also got bludgeoned by foreign policy commentators who faulted him for gifting Putin international legitimacy for nothing in return. Trump sounded downright solemn during his 12-minute “press conference” with Putin, admitting straight away that while unidentified progress was made, there wasn’t enough common ground to hash out even a rough, preliminary outline of a deal. “We had an extremely productive meeting, and many points were agreed to,” Trump asserted. “There are just a very few that are left. Some are not that significant. One is probably the most significant, but we have a very good chance of getting there.”
It doesn’t take a genius in international affairs to understand that “the most significant” item he was referring to was the one issue that prompted him to organize a summit with Putin in the first place: the war in Ukraine.
Author
Events on Russia
