Most of the Western commentary on the Alaska summit is criticizing President Trump for precisely the wrong reason. The accusation is that by abandoning his call for an unconditional ceasefire as the first step in peace talks, Trump has surrendered a key position and “aligned himself with Putin.”
This is nonsense. What Trump has done is to align himself with reality, and the real charge against him is that he should probably have done this from the start, and saved six months of fruitless negotiations and thousands of Ukrainian and Russian lives. Moreover, by continually emphasising a prior ceasefire as his key goal, Trump set himself up for precisely the kind of criticism that he is now receiving.
He is now entirely correct in saying that he wants “to go directly to a Peace Agreement, which would end the war, and not a mere Ceasefire, which often times do not hold up.”
The Russian side made clear from the very start of negotiations that they would not agree to an unconditional ceasefire. Indeed it would have been completely illogical for them to do so, given that military pressure on Ukraine, and advances on the battlefield, are by far the most important leverage that Russia can bring to bear at the negotiating table.
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