Trump Reasserts Control Over Russia Policy

Aug. 7—President Donald Trump has reasserted his control of U.S. strategic policy towards Russia and will meet with Putin next week. While the meeting will deal with finding a pathway to end the NATO proxy war in Ukraine against Russia, the summit—confirmed this morning by the Kremlin without giving any details—seeks to place improved relations and even collaboration between the world's two greatest nuclear superpowers back on track, sources close to the White House report.

Putin adviser Yuri Ushakov said that a “meeting between Putin and Trump (will take place) in the coming days,” adding that “work on the summit has now begun.”

The reports of the summit follow meetings in Moscow between Putin and his top negotiator, Kirill Dmitriev, the head of the Russian Sovereign Wealth Investment Fund, and Trump’s Special Envoy, Steve Witkoff. Trump described the meetings as having made "great progress."

“The venue of the meeting between the presidents of the Russian Federation and the United States, Vladimir Putin and Donald Trump, has been agreed, and the Kremlin will inform about it later,” Ushakov said. He noted that the two sides had exchanged "signals" on the Ukraine issue and discussed the possibility of "developing strategic cooperation between Moscow and Washington," but declined to give more details until Witkoff had reported back to Trump.

Backchannel Diplomacy and Peace Agenda

The press reported that the Russians had requested the meetings with Witkoff prior to the Aug. 8 deadline Trump had imposed for a new round of sanctions on Russia to force it to negotiate. But White House sources say that there have been "discussions and signals" sent through backchannels that set up the meeting. They say that Trump sent messages to Putin carried by Witkoff, which identified the agenda for a summit that would discuss matters beyond the issue of a Ukraine ceasefire. Witkoff had an outline of a Trump peace agenda that included Iran and discussions of nuclear disarmament—issues known to concern Putin.

Witkoff also made the proposal for a meeting between Putin, Trump, and NATO's Ukrainian dictator Volodymyr Zelenskyy after the Putin summit. White House sources say that such a meeting would only take place if there were a prospect for an agreement on a ceasefire and some provisional agreements on the outline of a peace deal. It would also be premised on an agreement by Zelenskyy "to behave" and to avoid his usual grandstanding, which famously got him thrown out of the White House in February.

Internal Opposition and Strategic Goals

These sources report that Trump is aware that factions of the pro-NATO war party operating inside and around the administration—in venues such as Secretary of State Marco Rubio's State Department—have worked with the conservative section of the pro-NATO media, including the New York Post, to undermine the President's efforts to change the confrontational direction of U.S.–Russian relations. Trump still believes he can work personally with the Russian President to promote peace in Ukraine and elsewhere, and cooperation on other strategic matters, including ending Iran's nuclear weapons ambitions.

These sources report that while Trump’s rhetoric became more confrontational in recent weeks over the lack of progress with Putin on a ceasefire in Ukraine, he recognizes that NATO's Ukrainian dictator Zelenskyy's refusal to accept the "reality of the battlefield"—where Ukraine has effectively lost the war and any hope of reclaiming the four eastern oblasts and Crimea, now part of the Russian Federation—has made any real progress toward peace impossible.

Ceasefire Proposals and Zelenskyy’s Position

It is not clear whether the Russians brought up a proposal for a ceasefire "in the air," which would end all drone, missile, and air attacks on Ukrainian targets, and halt Zelenskyy's dangerously provocative but militarily meaningless attacks on targets deep inside Russia. While falling short of a full ceasefire, sources report that Trump is favorable to this as it prevents or limits civilian casualties.

Trump waited until the meetings with Witkoff in Moscow were completed to brief European leaders and Zelenskyy, who attempted to portray Trump’s actions as being coordinated with him in his nightly radio address. "If he really believes that he is totally delusional," said a source close to the White House. "Trump is playing this hand, period."

This and other sources report that Zelenskyy is under extreme pressure from his military leadership to end the war as quickly as possible before it turns into a total rout. Ukraine, these sources say, simply no longer has the manpower reserves to match the Russians, and no amount of NATO or U.S. weapons can change that, in a war that has seen well over 1.5 million total casualties on both sides.

Sanctions and Future Summits

White House sources report that Trump is likely to go ahead with the sanctions on trade in Russian energy stocks tomorrow, even though he believes they will have little or no effect on Putin's decisions. The press was full of speculation as to whether there would be new sanctions on China, the largest purchaser of Russian oil stocks. The sources say that while there will be a lot of tough talk—mostly coming from Rubio, who as a Cuban émigré blames the Russians (the Soviet Union) for Castro ("He has a thing about Russia," said one source about the Secretary of State who also doubles as National Security Advisor)—the sources say the sanctions are likely to have a time fuse before they go into effect, perhaps three weeks, as was done with the sanctions on India for buying Russian oil imposed yesterday. "If things go as Trump and Putin want, in three weeks we could be in a whole different universe," said a source.

There has been some talk of a possible three-way summit with Trump, Putin, and President Xi Jinping of China. That is not viewed as either likely or necessary at the present moment. However, these sources say that a summit between Xi and Trump is in the works, at the request of the Chinese, with Xi planning to make a major proposal to Trump on trade and "a strategic partnership."