There is no Nobel Peace Prize awaiting Mr Trump at the end of this process
26 May 2025 8:55pm BST
Has the massive Russian drone and missile assault on Ukraine at the weekend finally opened the eyes of Donald Trump to the true intentions of Vladimir Putin? “He has gone absolutely crazy”, the US president said in response.
Mr Putin may be a calculating, ruthless autocrat but he is not crazy. He knows what he is doing, which is exploiting the American leader’s desperation to secure his legacy by landing a peace deal. He cannot understand why the Russian president will not play along given the carrots dangled in front of him.
He has been effectively promised Russia’s readmission into the comity of civilised nations, the dropping of sanctions and the re-opening of trade links. To Mr Trump’s mind this is a good deal and one that he finds hard to believe is being spurned.
“I’ve always had a very good relationship with Vladimir Putin of Russia, but something has happened to him,” said a baffled Mr Trump.
Yet he persists in treating both Russia and Ukraine as though they are equally culpable, reserving some of his sharpest criticism for Volodymyr Zelensky. The Ukrainian leader is making the pursuit of peace difficult, he said, and “doing his country no favours by talking the way he does”. This even though Zelensky has agreed to Washington’s call for a 30-day ceasefire, unlike the Kremlin.
Moscow’s reaction to Mr Trump’s attack on Putin was uncharacteristically muted in a deliberate bid to avoid antagonising the US president. A Kremlin spokesman thanked America for its efforts to achieve peace and blamed Mr Trump’s outburst on an “emotional overload”.
When will Mr Trump realise he is being played for a fool by the Russian leader, who has no intention of agreeing a settlement to the conflict other than on terms overwhelmingly favourable to Moscow? There is no Nobel Peace Prize awaiting Mr Trump at the end of this process.
Meanwhile in Washington, a bipartisan “supermajority” of 81 has been achieved in the Senate behind legislation that will impose draconian sanctions on Russia if it continues to prevaricate.
It also imposes 500pc tariffs on countries dealing with Russia, including supplying weapons or buying cheap oil. Since they include China and India the consequences for global trade would be immense.
The senators behind the measure said “it is increasingly clear to us that Putin is playing games”. The big question now is whether it is also finally clear to Mr Trump.
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Trump has finally realised that Putin thinks he’s an idiot
Let’s hope that The Donald is as mad as hell, and will put the boot in where it will hurt Putin the most
26 May 2025
With the peace negotiations poised to re-start, Russia launched a massive drone and missile strike against Ukraine this weekend. This capped a week that has seen continuous attacks against civilian targets. The Kremlin insists, of course, that Russia is attacking military targets, but even the most cynical Russian supporters would choke on the idea that every hospital and school in Ukraine is full of tanks and missiles. Even President Trump seems to have eventually concluded that Putin is taking him for a fool, after his vitriolic outburst on Sunday against the Russian leader
On Sunday the US president ranted that he “does not like” what Putin is doing, and called him “absolutely crazy”. To add fuel to the fire, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov suggested in response that Trump was suffering from “emotional overload”, and Russian newspapers are leading with the story that the US government is sanctioning Europe with high tariffs but not Russia.
The Russian papers may be full of anti-Ukraine and European rhetoric, but they are also full of the perilous state of the Russian economy. Everything except tank production is in free-fall downwards – and tank production is still nowhere near enough to match the grievous losses of the war. If Saudi and US threats to drive oil prices below $50 a barrel are realised, the Russian war machine is likely to grind to a halt by this year’s end.
Worryingly, there is also widespread assertion in the Russian media that “legally” the Soviet Union still exists, and the Special Military Operation in Ukraine is an internal matter. According to this logic that would also be the case if Russia invaded the Baltic States and Poland – as those countries expect, which is why they are building up their forces as fast as possible.
But, finally, President Trump seems to have realised that the Russians think he is an idiot. They are now openly goading him and the penny has finally dropped. The US president has belatedly realised that the “bad guys” are in Moscow and not in Kyiv and other European capitals. The big mistake Moscow has now made was to neglect Trump’s vanity. This is an error that Vladimir Putin may live to regret. Trump, in his anger at the obvious Russian disrespect, may now push the sanctions button and deprive Moscow of the vital oil revenue which allows it to sustain its massive army and creaking economy.
Frankly, I hope – and most outside the Kremlin are probably hoping with me – that Donald Trump is now as mad as hell, and will put the boot into Russia where it hurts the most. That’s the best chance of ending the war, rather than trying to negotiate with Putin.
Well I hate to say it, but I have sonething in common with Putin, I think Trump is an idiot too.