For Americans who came of age in the second half of the 20th century, there is a certain amount of sense in President Donald Trump’s statement that a “productive dialogue is not only good for the United States and good for Russia, but it is good for the world.”
Communication with a diabolical autocrat like Vladimir Putin is preferable to escalating tensions between two countries that have the nuclear capability to extinguish life on the planet.
We believe that most people, Trump supporters and detractors alike, agree with that premise.
What we don’t understand is why America’s tough-talking, swaggering president consistently chooses submission over strength when it comes to Putin – and we’re not the only ones confused by Trump’s behavior. Many who prefer to look on the bright side of his presidency – especially in comparison to that of his predecessor – are scratching and shaking their heads. As conservative columnist Ed Rogers wrote in the Washington Post, “Something ain’t right.”
In assessing Trump’s performance in Helsinki this week, the GOP-friendly editorial board of the Wall Street Journal wrote: “Monday’s joint press conference was a personal and national embarrassment. On stage with the dictator whose election meddling has done so much harm to his Presidency, Mr. Trump couldn’t even bring himself to say he believed his own intelligence advisers like Dan Coats over the Russian strongman.”
“For a rare moment in his presidency,” the Journal continued, “Mr. Trump also projected weakness. He was the one on stage beseeching Mr. Putin for a better relationship, while the Russian played it cool.”
Over at Fox News – yes, Fox News – Chris Wallace’s interview of Putin underscored why Trump’s fondness for his Russian counterpart is so bewildering. When presented with a copy of Robert Mueller’s indictment of a dozen military intelligence officers accused of hacking Democratic computers during the 2016 campaign, Putin glared at Wallace and refused the document. When asked why so many of his political opponents end up dead, Putin said all nations have their internal struggles and bizarrely pointed to the assassinations of John F. Kennedy and Martin Luther King Jr.
But the interview’s most surreal moment came when Putin denied that a Russian government video depicted a missile strike on Florida near Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort. Look closely and you will see that it is not a map of Florida, Putin said. We looked closely and so did a lot of other people: It is clearly a map of Florida. Like Trump, when Putin cries “fake news” he doesn’t really mean “fake news”; he means “uncomfortable news.”
Years from now, historians will write the definitive chapter – or volume – on this odd moment in U.S.-Russia relations. In a best-case scenario, Trump will be portrayed as a bumbling leader and useful idiot to Vladimir Putin. The worst case is that the truth is closer to what Jonathan Chait painstakingly outlined earlier this month in a lengthy New York Magazine article, in which he wrote that “it would be dangerous not to consider the possibility that the summit is less a negotiation between two heads of state than a meeting between a Russian-intelligence asset and his handler.”
We’re not quite ready to go that far, but we are certain of one thing: Something ain’t right.