Paul Goble
Moscow believes the upcoming Alaska summit will end Russian President Vladimir Putin’s international isolation, taking note of its location in Alaska, which Russia once owned.
Russian commentators are interpreting the summit as U.S. acceptance of Moscow’s view that decisions can be made about Ukraine without Ukraine.
Pro-Kremlin media claim that any outcome of the summit will be advantageous for Moscow: if U.S. President Donald Trump refuses to accept Putin’s terms, Trump will not get the deal he hopes for, but if he does, the gulf between Washington and Europe will deepen.
Since the announcement that Russian President Vladimir Putin and U.S. President Donald Trump will meet in Alaska on August 15, Russian state-controlled media outlets have talked about little else. Moscow commentators, none of them independent, have shown near unanimity. They believe, as the Kremlin likely does, that the bilateral meeting in Alaska is a win for Putin regardless of its outcome. Russian media asserts that the summit will end the international isolation that the West imposed on Putin after his full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. They also note that the summit, which is taking place in Alaska—a Russian territory from the mid-18th century until 1867 that remains symbolically important to Russians—has prompted Trump to delay and possibly cancel a new round of sanctions against Russia. Additionally, perhaps most importantly, Russian media suggests that Trump accepts Putin’s view that Russia and the United States can make decisions about Ukraine without Ukraine.
Russian commentators say that no matter how Trump responds to Putin at the meeting on the issue of Ukraine, Putin will gain an additional victory. If the U.S. president refuses to accept Putin’s terms, Trump will not get the deal he craves. If he does accept them, the gulf between Washington and Europe will deepen, a key Russian strategic goal. Because Russian commentators are confident that the Americans are aware of this situation, they suggest that Trump may seek a broader accord to hide Putin’s victory on Ukraine. If a broader accord results, Russian media suggests that Trump will spark Western comparisons to the Yalta Conference of 1945 or even the Munich Conference of 1938, strengthening Putin’s hand in his efforts to reassert Moscow’s status as a superpower as it was during the Cold War.
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