Friends + Interlocutors,

The dramatic meeting between Trump and Putin in Alaska two weeks ago is beginning to look like a washout. Trump’s initiative to start a genuine peace process via an understanding or dialogue with the Russian president has failed. Evidently, Putin has taken note and renewed hostilities in earnest.

At the time, from Trump’s point of view, it seemed to be a success, almost a breakthrough. Putin agreed. Then the seven dwarfs from Europe rushed across the Atlantic to the Oval Office to throw a monkey wrench into the start of rapprochement. Trump held court.

It now looks like Trump caved, and that the dwarfs as well as the Washington foreign policy establishment have won. I have come to this conclusion after digesting a Financial Times article online today entitled Europe has ‘pretty precise’ plan to send troops to Ukraine, von der Leyen says.

Ursula von der Leyen, President of the European Commission, states that there is a plan underway to send European troops into Ukraine as part of a security arrangement and that Trump has signed on to it. This is supposed to take place after a peace deal is signed between Ukraine and Russia. 

Ursula knows that this would be in effect a NATO-izing of Ukraine and therefore unacceptable to the Kremlin. It blows up any possibility of a deal. That is clearly her goal. The war will continue.

Putin wants a neutral Ukraine like Austria is. Understandably, he doesn’t want more of a NATO presence in Ukraine than already exists. Perhaps Ursula is having an attack of wishful thinking, but she volunteers that, "President Trump reassured us that there will be [an] American presence as part of the backstop. That was very clear and repeatedly affirmed.” Read the article.

When did this happen? Supposedly when the seven dwarfs met Trump in the Oval Office. This is the first time I’ve heard it confirmed. If so, we are right back where we started before the Alaska summit. That is what Ursula and her fellow European leaders want. She and they are playing games and acting the part of warmongers. Trump is going along with it.

“Putin has not changed, he is a predator” proclaimes Ursula. This close-minded, childish attitude is a prescription for war, and not just a proxy war but potentially a full-scale European war with the U.S. involved. Why? Because of an adjustment in Ukraine’s borders? Because of Crimea? It’s crazy. 

So John Helmer was right after all. He was interviewed after the Alaska summit and right after the seven dwarfs left the Oval Office. John Helmer is the longest running journalist stationed in Moscow. His contacts are very good. He knows what he is talking about. The interview is quite long but well worth it…

Patrick

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