As many Western commentators are showing disappointment with a summit that has produced no cease-fire or peace deal for the war in Ukraine, the Russian side is celebrating their country’s return to the world stage.
Through Moscow’s eyes, the West’s strategy of isolation through sanctions has now — officially — failed.
“The Western media are in a […] frenzy, changing into full madness: For three years, they have been reporting that Russia is in isolation, and today they saw the red carpet rolled out to the Russian president in the United States,” said Russia’s Foreign Ministry’s spokeswoman Maria Zakharova.
US President Donald Trump even greeted Russia’s Vladimir Putin with applause on that red carpet. Three hours later, it was not the host but the guest who kicked off the press statements. And set the tone.
Putin got to present his version of history — talking about the “root causes” of Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, which started in February 2022. That’s shorthand for Ukraine’s desire to join the EU and NATO and wriggle free from the Russian sphere of influence.
Putin seems to feel deeply offended by that. He wants Ukraine to respect Russia again.
The Russian president then pledged to “turn the page” and go back to bilateral cooperation.
And he clearly knew how to schmooze Trump into standing next to him like a well-behaved pupil. “If it had been Trump [as US leader in 2022], there would have been no war —I can confirm that,” Putin said repeating one of Trump’s favorite lines.
The US leader smiled and nodded.
It was a scene much to the delight of hard-line pro-Kremlin politicians.
“Vladimir Putin has achieved a breakthrough in the wall of isolation from the ‘first world,’ from the rich Western countries. Putin has received several examples of his own psychological dominance over Trump, which should only strengthen his confidence that the damned bourgeoisie can and should be squeezed,” a political scientist told pro-Kremlin daily newspaper Novye Izvestia.
“And all this at the cost of a simple flight to the other end of the country and a couple of minutes of listening to unpleasant questions from journalists. Without even condescending to answer them,” the analyst was also quoted as saying.
