https://heathercoxrichardson.substack.com/p/august-17-2025
"On the heels of President Donald J. Trump’s Friday meeting with Russia’s
president Vladimir Putin in Anchorage, Alaska, Trump will meet with Ukraine’s
president Volodymyr Zelensky Monday afternoon at the White House. According to
Barak Ravid of
Axios, Trump called Zelensky from Air Force One on the way
home from Alaska. Secretary of State Marco Rubio and White House special envoy
Steve Witkoff were also on the hour-long call. The leaders of the European
Commission, Finland, France, Germany, Italy, the North Atlantic Treaty
Organization (NATO), and the United Kingdom then joined the call for another
half hour.
In the call, Trump embraced Putin’s view of the conflict, telling Zelensky and
European leaders that Putin does not want a ceasefire. Trump indicated that he
is abandoning his own demand for a ceasefire and adopting Putin’s position that
negotiations should take place without one. Zelensky insists on a ceasefire
before negotiations. After the call, Trump posted on social media that “it was
determined by all that the best way to end the horrific war between Russia and
Ukraine is to go directly to a Peace Agreement, which would end the war, and
not a mere Ceasefire Agreement, which often times do not hold up.” “All” is
doing a lot of work in that sentence: it appears to mean Putin, with the
possible agreement now of Trump.
Key unanswered questions from Friday’s summit were why it ended so abruptly,
with the cancellation of a planned luncheon and more discussions, and why Trump
immediately told
Fox News Channel personality Sean Hannity, “Because of what
happened today, I think I don’t have to think about [further sanctions on
Russia] now. I may have to think about it in two weeks or three weeks or
something, but we don’t have to think about that right now.”
The abrupt cancellation could mean that U.S. officials sent Putin packing
without lunch because he would not agree to a ceasefire. But it seems worth
keeping on the table that Trump has recently exhibited both an inability to
focus on any topic, and a need to live in a carefully constructed world that
ignores reality and assures him he is the best and the brightest. A high-stakes
meeting with principals about a very real situation might have been too much
for him to manage for a full day.
At the press conference following the summit,
NBC News White House
correspondent Peter Alexander reported that what struck him was “the looks on
the faces of a lot of the American delegation here. Karoline Leavitt…, Steve
Witkoff, who came into the room, then left quickly, then came back in. Leavitt
appeared to be a bit stressed out, anxious. Their eyes were wide, almost ashen
at times.”
At 8:31 this morning, Trump posted one word, “bela,” on his social media
account. California governor Gavin Newsom’s social media account, which has
been trolling Trump by imitating his boastful, insulting, all-caps posts,
wrote: “We broke Donald Trump.”"
Cheers,
*** Xanni ***
--
mailto:xanni@xanadu.net Andrew Pam
http://xanadu.com.au/ Chief Scientist, Xanadu
https://glasswings.com.au/ Partner, Glass Wings
https://sericyb.com.au/ Manager, Serious Cybernetics
