What happened in Alaska? Here are the key conclusions. “It was too much”
Lavrov in this way spat on Ukrainians and a rational part of Western societies. According to a coherent Russian strategy, the negotiations were therefore started long before Trump and Putin managed to land at the Elmendorf-Richardson military base.
Here is the whole drama of this situation. In the strict surroundings of Trump, which affects all the president's decisions, the lack of one person with even a pale concept of Russia. A special envoy of the US President to Moscow Steve Witkoff, derived from the American developer, repeatedly showed completely ignorance, limiting his mission to repeat the word after the word of the Kremlin's demands.
Donald Trump himself is the personification of the lack of this professional knowledge in the presidential administration – the chaotically thrashing between patting Putin on the back and the threats of flooding Ukraine with weapons. Such a man sat in Anchorage for talks with a heavyweight player, having a deep understanding of the opponent and clearly defined goals.
Among the many American misunderstandings of the Russian way of politics, there is a misunderstanding of this simple fact that they treat every trace of good will or sympathy by the adversary as a weakness.
Trump showed a lot before the meeting. It was too much to develop a red carpet by a Russian criminal. In addition, Putin was walking around the prestigious F-22 Raptor fighters, and the B-2 Spirit superbomber in four F-35 fighters flew in his honor. Three times the cameras registered how Trump clapped Putin while welcoming. In the recording in social media, the White House cut out these applause from the welcome. All this is too late. The applause for Putin has circulated and the Russian media will circulate for a long time. And also worldly.
The meeting lasted two hours and 50 minutes and judging by the statements of both parties, did not bring any decisive decisions. Putin, having received a voice, smoothly resulted in Moscow propaganda.
“Events in Ukraine are associated with fundamental threats to our security. I have said many times that the Ukrainian nation is a brother nation, which may seem strange in current circumstances. So everything that happens is a tragedy and great pain for us, which is why we are honestly interested to end this situation” – these cynical words of the Russian leader again presented the aggressor as a victim. Unfortunately, many will believe in them.
Compared to this, Trump in its surprisingly short statement did not convey anything worth commenting. Although saving in words may suggest that the Russians also played him in the negotiating field.
Vladimir Putin and Donald Trump in Alaska
Politics often must be cool and pragmatic up to pain. However, too often we forget that it should also have a moral dimension, because it moves to the whole societies. In this particular case, we did not learn any specifics, because they were not given. However, we learned a lot about the submission of a representative of the greatest Western power towards the war criminal. And it was thoroughly demoralizing. Would he develop a rug in front of Hitler, Stalin, Pol later?
Such insulting of Ukrainians and many other European societies may have consequences when it comes to their attitude towards the US as a reliable partner, not only military, but also business, which Trump cares about.
When the meeting in Alaska ended, anti -aircraft alarms were heard in Ukraine. Another wave of Shaad combat drones has been identified over the country. Many of them will hit civilians again, confirming the Russian war crimes in Ukraine. There was no case in the date. Similar attacks were recorded during previous conversations in various formats.
West headless, Russia with a plan
The meeting in Alaska once again proved the weaknesses of the West in many fields.
After 11 years of war in the east and three in the full -frame version of Russia's invasion of Ukraine, the West still did not formulate the strategy of action. The famous words of Olaf Scholz from May 2022 that “Russia cannot win and Ukraine cannot lose” became a symbol of the non -western non -acism, which by Moscow are read only in terms of weakness. However, do we know the specific goals of the West in this war? NO.
For a change, Russia has a clear plan in this war from the beginning. Here is a list of precise and opening of Putin's communicated wishes towards Ukraine:
- The occupation of all Donbass and incorporation into the territory of the Russian Federation along with other Ukrainian lands already occupied, as well as the recognition of this act by the West
- Closing the door to NATO by West Ukraine, combined with the waiver of such aspirations by Kiev, i.e. bringing Ukraine to the status of a neutral state
- Limiting the military potential and the number of Ukraine's armed forces. At various stages of negotiations, various demands were presented regarding the scale of this restriction, but in each version it meant a rapid defeat of Ukraine to the next invasion of Russia
- Cessation of supplies of weapons to Ukraine by Western allies
- Conducting elections in Ukraine – implicitly, postponing the President of Zelanski to another candidate favorable to Russia
- Formal protection of the Russian language in Ukraine
- In addition, Russia adds unspecified, but properly abusive to Kiev's “denazification” of Ukraine
Putin's wish list towards the USA is no less precise and open:
- Abolition of sanctions for Russia
- Frostboning EUR 200 billion from Russian money frozen currently in Euroclear, an international financial institution based in Brussels
- Normalization of diplomatic relations between Moscow and Washington, and then with other Western countries
- Normalization of business relations according to the above formula
- Withdrawal of American troops and infrastructure from Central and Eastern European countries
- Ban on placing American medium -range rockets throughout Europe
Of course, if you have such an extensive package of conditions, then you also give way to. However, what is to negotiate the West if it does not present to the Russian aggressor any specific demands? The only thing about excluding the exclusion from negotiating conversations of European leaders managed to extract, it is impossible to meet “first suspension of weapons, then negotiations” and inflated with idealism “Nothing about Ukraine without Ukraine”.
Yes, before negotiations, Trump talked with them, but only the interests of the direct participants of the conversation – Russia and the USA were pursued in Anchorage. What interests? Europe did not find out about them because it was not there.
An additional problem is the already mentioned ignorance of the realities by Donald Trump combined with his obsessive, as many commentators claim, the desire to win the Nobel Peace Prize.
According to the diplomatic sources of our colleague Kamil Dziubka in Alaska, Putin's people were to prepare a presentation for Trump about the history of Russia, which would show that Ukraine was always part of the Russian Empire, so taking away only Eastern territories from this country would even be a concession from Putin. It is easy to believe that deprived of the idea of the true history of Russia and Ukraine, Trump was fooled by such a trick.
Fear of Munich, displacement of the Yalta
Increasingly, comparisons of the current situation to the conference in Munich and Yalta appear in European public circulation.
As a reminder, in 1938, in Munich, the leaders of Great Britain, France and Italy gave Germany a part of the Czechoslovakian territory over the heads of the leaders of this country as part of the Appeasement policy. Half a year later, Hitler broke the findings of the conference, occupying the rest of the Czech Republic and Moravia. This is a clear example of how the Appeasement policy encourages aggressors to further aggression because it is nothing but a sign of weakness.
On the other hand, during the conference in Yalta in 1945, the leaders of Russia, the USA and Great Britain divided the influence zones of the powers of the powers above the heads of all others, including Poles, who came to the Soviet shoe for over four decades.
As soon as such questions arise in public space, expert answers immediately arise that such comparisons are premature, excessive, unauthorized. According to the authors of this commentary, this is another manifestation of Europe's indecision and fear. After all, the meeting in Alaska took place above our heads. Not the first such in recent months and probably not the last.
Talks about the fate of the world, including ourselves, are conducted without our participation. In such a situation, each comparison is authorized.
