Can I ask whether Trump has said / tweeted / ventriloquised via his puppets anything about the Russian escalation?
If he hasn’t is this because he realises he is in no position to be opining, given his links to Putin are still under scrutiny, or some deference to a tradition of letting the next President get on with it? [I realise how unlikely the second option is as I wrote it]
My WAG is it would pretty much be the same thing. Threats of sanctions. Moving troops into Eastern Europe to calm them down and make sure the Russian’s understand the limits. It’s more than possible that Trump et al wouldn’t have gotten the same degree of assistance from NATO or our European allies (the Germans haven’t exactly fallen over themselves with Biden, I could see serious pushback if it had been Trump) as Biden has gotten, but essentially I think the US would be the same response overall with maybe a few minor differences. Trump might have tried to use his personal charm (
) or charisma to have a face to face with Putin the way Macron tried…and probably with similar results, i.e. Putin would have told him sure, we don’t want war and want to work with you guys to de-escalate all of this, then turned around and gone ahead with what they wanted anyway. It would have just been Trump with egg on his face instead of Macron, but the outcome would have been similar.
I agree with everything in this post, but want to mention a few specific items.
There is no doubt Trump would have cleared the way for Russia for two nationalistic reasons and several personal ones. First his man crush on Putin is pretty well documented and would do anything to gain his approval (Trump surely has daddy issues where Putin is concerned in my opinion.) Second, Trump’s petty disappointment in getting any investigation or even false announcement of an investigation of any Biden would play into his hope for Ukraine to be occupied. On the international stage, the final fact is that Trump doesn’t care about those things that do not concern him personally. Private matter, none of our business seems like the most likely public remark he would venture.
Privately however, he would also try to get something out of Putin for standing aside. I think it would be personal, rights to build or buy Russian hotels and golf courses, co signing loans, a romantic dinner for two, telling Trump he is proud of him. Any benefit toward the The United States would be secondary or an afterthought if it existed at all.
Biden has rebuilt many relationships and strengthened NATO significantly in the last year and especially in the last month and a half. He has given Putin pause and made a very strong case for “Don’t do this! If you pick this fight you will regret it, Jack.”
I don’t believe Putin wants to hold Ukraine in the traditional sense, I believe he just wants his puppets running things in these states to push the NATO border as far away as possible (and if he had to give them up in a worst case scenario in the future – Mother Russia is still unscathed!) He is a Cold War guy with a cold war mentality- he wants to recreate the Soviet Union without the trouble of a Warsaw Pact that others can use. He is creating vassal states pure and simple.
No, he is worse. He is Neville Chamberlain looking to appease his new daddy. As an isolationist he is both short-sighted and wrong minded. He only cares about “shithole” countries as far as they create revenue sources for him.
Yes!
Trump thinks Putin is the strong international leader he longs to be. He would want to have secret pacts and decoder rings with his new bestest buddy and he would want Putin to punish his enemies and rivals and agree that whoso ever is Putin’s enemy is an enemy of the USA!
100% concur. Like so much above, very well stated.
I don’t agree that was a central contention of the Trump-Russia argument. Some people contended it, of course…Jonathan Chait at The New Yorker, for example. But the mainstream view was that Trump was an unwitting Russian asset, mostly because of his admiration for authoritarianism and the fact that he’s easier to play than those kazoos they give to first graders. There’s a long and rather darkly amusing history of Trump, after returning from business trips to Russia, spouting off about NATO screwing the US and wanting to run for President.
But there is absolutely no question that Russian ran a robust social media propaganda campaign designed to promote Trump’s candidacy. There no question about their involvement in the DNC hack. There no question that members of Trump’s inner circle made multiple attempts to assist the Russians in their efforts. There’s no question that a member of Trump’s inner circle channeled internal polling data to one of Putin’s oligarchs.
It’s just that some of us think this was wrong, very very wrong, and that it’s a serious national security issue and probably a crime when people involved with a high level political campaign attempts to work with an adversarial foreign government.
And I will mention that Russia absolutely did have kompromat on Trump for about a year. This is a fact beyond dispute. The kompromat I am referring to is the e-mail chain about the Trump Tower meeting, the one where Donald Trump,Jr set up a meeting with someone claiming to be an agent of the Russian government for the purpose of getting dirt on the Clintons. For about a year, the FBI didn’t know about this meeting, the public didn’t know about this meeting, but Russia knew, Russia had proof, and the Trumps knew it. That’s how kompromat works.
This this this this.
@Ann_Hedonia’s points re Manafort are so integral to understanding how deep Trump was in with the Russians – probably without even knowing it – before 2016. Trump thought he had a business arrangement. He has no concept of being compromised as we understand it. He only knows someone can hurt him if certain information is revealed.
And again, let’s look at how Trump was manipulated by Putin even before he became president, by changing the Republican platform to soften US support for Ukraine. Does anyone think Trump thought of that by himself? Right there, the whole game was largely revealed.
Re Trump’s kompromat, while I believe a pee tape exists because Trump confirmed it himself by asking the FBI to look for it, I don’t think that’s what ever really worried him. His Achilles’ heel is money. To this day, there is the mystery surrounding why Deutsche Bank continued to loan to Trump despite every reason not to. When all is said and done, I think it will be shown that Putin guaranteed Trump’s loans through Deutsche Bank. You could not as for a better way to string up a puppet named Trump.
The only exception I would take to this Putin characterization is that the NATO worries are a made-up pretext by Putin himself. NATO was not and is not courting Ukraine to join their alliance. NATO chooses only to not deny Ukraine access to NATO if they are able to meet certain standards, as Putin would like them to. But it’s not up to Putin. It’s up to Ukraine.
Putin nurses his long-term goal of recreating the power of the old Soviet Union, as you point out. It is his sole motivation for gratuitous land grabs.
Nice post. I respect well written counterarguments and acknowledge that this is one.
I disagree with several items from your earlier post:
I respectfully point out that in your latest post, you’ve walked back on each of these items, or at least used more temperate language.
I agree with you that the Russian interference in the 2016 elections was to cause chaos for the sake of chaos, and that Putin had the goal of harming Hillary Clinton. I disagree with the idea that Trump was a part of a Russian led conspiracy to put him in the White House, and also the idea that as President he was receiving and following instructions from Putin. If the best proof of that allegation is that he had private conversations with Putin, that’s very poor proof.
Where I find your argument the weakest is where you assert that Putin was “installing a useful idiot”, but that he had a specific goal in mind for that useful idiot. Especially if, as you assert, that Putin didn’t think that Trump would win in 2016. Why would he have an end goal in mind for someone he didn’t think would win? And why would he think that he could form a reliable long-term plan based on an untrustworthy idiot? You’re contradicting yourself.
You’re also contradicting your argument when you agree that Trump wasn’t “actively assisting” Putin, but that he was accomplishing “Practically everything Trump did during his term benefited Putin and disadvantaged the US. Softening the ground for an invasion when Trump won a second term.”
Earlier I labelled your ideas a conspiracy theory. I acknowledge that you’ve provided better arguments supporting your theory than in your original post. But I still think you’re theory has several elements for which there is zero direct proof and that requires a suspension of disbelief:
TLDR: Where you see treason, I see a lifelong jerk continuing to be a jerk. Provide compelling evidence of treason and I’ll change my mind. Otherwise, I think this is a continuation of a witch hunt that started back in 2016.
Would you like to open up a new thread and elaborate on this idea? I feel like you’re promulgating another conspiracy theory, and would be potentially be interested in listening to your evidence and possibly arguing against your premise, but I don’t want to turn this thread into a you vs. me debate.
Relevant to this thread, Trump has a history of ignoring business deals. Why would he feel like an obligation to Putin was more compelling than an obligation to Deutsche Bank or anywhere else? Despite your belief, I’m pretty sure the existence of the pee tape has been thoroughly refuted. It certainly has never been shown to be existent, despite huge press interest in its existence.
Also, from your NPR cite:
“Trump said on the campaign trail that he didn’t want World War III over Ukraine. And he wanted better relations with Russia,” Gordon said. “It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out that arming Ukraine isn’t consistent with those two positions.”
Biden has also said, in effect, that he’s not going to cause World War III over Ukraine. So shall we praise both Biden and Trump for not wanting to be in a US vs Russia war, or condemn them both for having ulterior motives?
Like and agree with almost every word of this post. The previous one however I have some bones to pick there.
Was not aware of these details behind the Crimean headlines but do not dispute this (and trust you enough not to look it up for myself which makes you far more trusted than most of my family).
Wow, wow, wow, wow! That is a very big jump and makes two mistakes; disregarding facts in evidence and and entering facts not established!
Trump was an enabler of sorts at least for Putin! I cannot prove at this time that Putin controls those foreign loans Trump has coming due, but it is a fair bet. But even beyond that Putin manages Trump more than Edgar Bergen managed Charlie McCarthy. Besides Trump publicly disregarding his intelligence agency in order to agree with Putin’s lame denial, there are all those poison pills (and more!) that Aspenglow mentioned above. The fact is as others have pointed out, trump can be easily manipulated by foreign leaders who wish to do so-- and no one manipulates him better than Putin.
It does not automatically follow that the entire administration could have been co-opted to do his desires for him. Putin was still suffering for Crimea and it would have been bad business to take on Ukraine (a much bigger ordeal overall!) so soon after that. The smart money was on waiting; Trump had already weakened NATO and might have dissolved it completely by pulling the US out in a second term. It was better, more strategic to wait and see. What he saw was Biden making success and therefore decided to act now before he completely repairs the damage Trump had caused.
While waiting was the smart move it didn’t work as planned for two reasons: 1) Trump was not reelected, 2) Biden was able to repair international affairs despite all the domestic challenges he faced.
I don’t think anyone believes this buildup was a long standing plan waiting to be put into action. Rather, Putin wanted to place Ukraine under the control of someone of HIS choosing. He waited for a better opportunity-- that opportunity never materialized so he used a different tactic. He used military exercises as an excuse to build up military presence and is now using outright war as short-term tactic to get what he wants – agreements to keep NATO out of Ukraine. (He is also going for his secondary goal-- regime change in Ukraine to a more Russian friendly leader by destabilizing the nation and region.)
Two things are very certain: Trump would not even try to back Putin down and would likely encourage the move if he could get something out of it for himself. AND: Biden has been quite effective, more so that might have been imagined two months ago when Afghanistan was a failure hanging around his neck, NATO was not very unified, there were several domestic problems for Biden to address while ignoring Eastern Europe, and a perception by some that Biden is too old and feeble to muster what he has managed to muster.
I think you two are both right and sort of looking for or staying with a fight instead of finding agreement. Trump is a Putin puppet, Biden is more capable than expected (except apparently by me and Aspenglow), Putin is looking to rebuild the Soviet Union and has been since it fell.
This seems like a simple misunderstanding to me. No one was blaming Trump for a military buildup well after he was out of office. That was never stated nor implied that I can see- but the idea that Trump would have handled differently seems to be a consensus agreement. It also seems to me a consensus that Biden has done better than might have been expected considering all the balls he has in the air. Can’t we all just get along??
This seems like failure of application in specifics to me:
And Trump DID help Putin in a million and one ways even taking his word over Trumps own advisors. It does not even begin to hint the current buildup has anything at all to do with Trump.
We have not had a one term president since Bush Senior. As I have argued in this and my previous post, it is possible to “buy” something and not use it at the very first opportunity. Just because Putin didn’t move on Ukraine during the first term of Trump does not mean that was not a consideration in propping him up! Personally I believe that was a secondary or tertiary reason-- but a reason none the less. Getting Trump elected made the USA a laughingstock and significantly weakened us in many ways (especially in international respect). By weakening the US, he automatically weakened NATO, and by weakening NATO made Ukraine more vulnerable. But more immediately than that he had a clown with a brightly colored face doing and saying things that made him appear like an international statesman who still belongs to the G7 (I am not even sure they belong to the G20 anymore).
Wrenching_Spanners, I wish you would re-read those posts (perhaps with less of a chip on your shoulder??) and see they still seem so offensive to you. I find nothing that links the 2016 election of Trump to a 2022 Russian troupe buildup. The waiting for a second term thing I have addressed already.
Okay, reading this post first would have saved me some typing. It was hard to determine which part to quote because it is all accurate and well stated.
I am going to stop and post here. I want to enjoy reading the posts and not hesitate to comment. Thanks to all for the thoughtful and wise posts by which I mean ALL of them.
I think that to the extent that Putin had kompromat he didn’t use it in the traditional way. If he had simply blackmailed Trump, “Do this or I destroy you!” It would have backfired. By threatening Trump he would have become Trump’s enemy, and while Trump might have somewhat complied with Putin out of necessity , he would be looking for ways to hit back at him. If Putin had threatened Trump you wouldn’t have seen Trump fawning over him the way he did. Trump isn’t one to hide his emotions.
The more likely way of Putin using it would be to ingratiate himself with Trump by helping to fix the problem.
“My dear Trump, I heard on the news that I leaked about the existence of a video tape involving peeing prostitutes. Whoever would do such a thing, perhaps that witch Hillary Clinton. Well have no fear, my friend! I will get to the bottom of it and make sure that whomever is responsible is made to suffer for what he did and that whatever fake the have created to tarnish your good name will never see the light of day. You can rest easy, your pal Vlad will take care of everything/ But since I’m doing you this favor perhaps you can do one for me, you scratch my back I scratch yours, yes? There are these annoying sanctions…”
I actually don’t see how the US capacity or will to respond to an invasion of Ukraine is appreciably different because of Trump’s actions.
Basically the situation since before Russia invaded Georgia is that NATO makes diplomatic inroads with former Soviet states, and in response Russia invades those states. Then NATO countries give weapons to the countries that were invaded and sanction Russia, but don’t come close to risking an all-out confrontation. NATO nations really haven’t even given all that much military support to non-NATO nations since the fall of the Soviet Union. Even under Obama, military support for NATO came too little and very late.
I think Putin realizes that the sanctions hurt and doesn’t want to invade these countries if he doesn’t have to and additionally is worried that being too aggressive will encourage other countries to join NATO, but if the buffer between Russia and NATO is threatened he feels it’s worth it. So we get a situation where once there is enough at risk with diplomatic ties between countries like Ukraine and their western neighbors, he’s willing to invade. I think he’s got a lot out of Trump being president for 4 years, but I don’t think the dynamic in Eastern Europe has been affected either to the point where it matters that much who is president or if there has been enough history of institutional rot or diplomatic fraying.
And I think that’s a better explanation for Putin’s timing on this. I guess it’s possible Putin bet on Trump winning the election, but I don’t know how he could be that sure of what would happen. Hillary Clinton lost by a few thousand votes in key states. I don’t think Trump was a horse you could bet on and expect more than slightly over a coin flip.
Lifelong jerks can be traitors too. We can nit-pick about the definition of treason as spelled out in the constitutions all day long. It’s been done. Call it sedition, call the insurrection what it was. I call it treason.
Why not call it first degree murder?
There are so many good points being made and posts that I want to comment upon but today simply does not allow me the time to do so. Hopefully I will be hyperproductive in the afternoon and return before evening!
This is such a good post and I agree with much of it. I believe that many of us agree as to substance but are very devoted to a particular phrasing or a certain framing of what we largely agree is going on. But this post, specifically the portion I quoted, tells a different story.
I am not here trying to provide proof of anything. I am a guy in my home office using what I hope is well informed speculation to assert deeply held beliefs. Without going back and double checking, I am pretty certain Ann_Hedonia has provided documentation of certain facts in published accounts and that Aspenglow has likewise provided information that can be verified if it was not already. But if you require proof you are being unreasonable to some degree.
Of course you are entitled to your own views and require whatever you deem appropriate as proof. But you are asking a group of message board posters to prove treason before you will consider that option might be true?? That is too much! Trump was the most powerful man in the world with the benefit of untold power, wealth, and even government agencies at his disposal to hide his crimes. Even the best funded and most sincere and honest prosecutors are having trouble “proving” his guilt (but I have every hope they eventually will).
Again, I will try to speak only for myself but I believe there are others who may have similar views also. You call Trump a “lifelong jerk” I think of him as someone who has used his jerkiness to commit serious crimes. There are plenty of examples of him being worse than a jerk. For example he had been warned to preserve papers and to never tear them up largely due to Watergate and the most blatantly criminal president we had had up until that time. Yet he continued to tear, shred, burn, and flush documents. Do you honestly believe he went to those extraordinary lengths because he is a jerk? Or is it FAR more likely that he did it to hide his criminal behavior?
I honestly believe the argument where there is smoke there must be fire to be a weak argument. But where there are raging wildfires – there tends to be smoke, fire, destruction, etc. Trump has never faced justice for all the many things he has done because he games the system. I am not a fan of Hilary Clinton and never have been (have developed a begrudging respect however) but she did go in and face the music. She has been called to account for herself and her actions many, many times and nothing has been found. Compare that to Trump who openly destroys evidence and stole boxes of classified documents. (Which doesn’t prove the crimes I am claiming he is guilty of by itself- he may have just had a profit motive to sell them later. But it does fit the profile of someone who is very guilty and trying to cover up their crime.)
I am offended by the use of the term “witch hunt” as if it refers to a manufactured investigation conducted out of personal or political motivations rather than the large amount of evidence already compiled against Trump. In this particular I judge you to have the weaker argument.
It seems we all believe Trump is a lifelong jerk. I contend that he has used his jerkiness to commit many crimes, destabilize our form of government, abuse his power, personally profit from his position, pursue innocent parties for personal reasons, and cover up all of it-- or at least try to. I find it very unlikely that Trump is not guilty of at least most of this, but you are right- I cannot prove it. (Bet the January 6th Committee might be able to though! We will see in a few months.)
All of that being said, you have made some good observations and salient points about Ukraine which I hope to address - - - - sometime in the next day or two (really hope it isn’t longer than that but it is quite busy this weekend).
Witch hunt? Seriously?
I can see your argument about treason, treason is a very high bar and I’m not sure anything Trump has done rises to that level. But to argue that nothing he’s done warrants investigating……that’s ridiculous, especially considering the incredibly low bar that the federal government has for launching investigations.
It turned out to be absolutely true that a Putin-connecting Russian lawyer approached the Trump campaign with an offer to help their campaign with information that was likely illegally obtained, and that lawyer explicitly represented herself as a representative of the Russian government. It is absolutely true that high level Trump campaign officials agreed to the meeting. Do you really feel that didn’t even warrant an investigation? What if Hillary Clinton had done it? What if Biden had met with a CCP official to get the information their spy network had on Trump?
So if you think all the investigations against Trump were unwarranted, you be cool with it if Joe Biden tells Zelensky he has to launch a criminal investigation against Donald Trump Junior if he wants US military aid, right? Because he’s President and if he feels in the best interest of the country that Don Jr is tortured in foreign prison……he’s the PRESIDENT right?
I am going to allow myself one comment this morning before I leave the house because this struck me the other day when I first read it.
Based upon Tucker Carlson and the rest of FOX News taking the Russian point of view early on, and further considering how Trump treated Ukraine when he was president as well as how he regarded Putin personally – I would fully expect Trump to blame the entire thing on Ukraine find Russia blameless, and side with them.
Currently, Trump can trumpet how he kept Russia from invading while he was president – largely because Russia was NOT building up armies or trying to invade then. But in the situation we are facing now there is no doubt in MY mind that the invasion would have already been launched, and with Trump’s blessing.
Trump: “Ukraine insists upon resisting historic bonds and is leaving my good friend Putin along with all of Russia no choice but to take these steps.”
Germany and other countries that rely upon Russian energy for heating – who would be lacking the assurances of US help that Biden has provided would have had little choice except to go along. I believe the unspoken agreement among all NATO nations, and perhaps secretly agreed to between NATO and Putin would be: Okay, but Ukraine is the end of it!! They have always really been Russia’s ally anyway, so as long as Putin goes no further we will look the other way in this instance.
Well, it certainly looks like you called his shot (so far).
There is still the possibility for further escalation but Putin is stepping far more tenderly than I had expected and has indicated that is as far has he intends to go. Of course he also said he was withdrawing troops while he was not so-- not the most reliable source of his own intentions.
I am not sure what to think of this measured invasion. Perhaps Biden has backed him down and he will settle for this small victory, perhaps this is a first step in a larger aggression, or maybe something that has not occurred to me. In any case, for the time being Aspenglow wins the (fictional) prediction pool.
My newest guess is that Putin intends to fully occupy the areas he has just declared to be independent states and let things calm down as that becomes a new normal. Then sometime down the road he will make a half-assed attempt to expand that area for ten minutes - - - and then as a sign of goodwill and peace he will retreat to just occupying those areas and giving the world a complete lack of hostilities as long as he gets to keep his new expanded border (whatever he calls the area-- it will de facto be a part of Mother Russia at that point.
More than that, I’m sure Trump would have announced some absurd deal like “I talked to Putin and we agreed that we’ll let him occupy Ukraine in exchange for cheaper gas and no US troop deaths. Oh by the way we’re out of NATO.”
This crisis has a very different shape if a Russian stooge occupies the Oval office.
This is wildly incorrect. The notion that the Russians had some sort of ongoing leverage over Trump was a huge deal in the Trump-Russia investigation, and was widely voiced by many people including at the highest levels of the Democratic Party and their point people involved in the investigation.
Today’s press conference, to Pelosi, was evidence enough that Trump acts this way because the Russians have dirt on him. The spectacle, she said in a statement, “proves that the Russians have something on the President, personally, financially or politically.”
In his statement today, though, Schumer for the first time offered compromising information as a possible explanation. “Millions of Americans will continue to wonder,” Schumer said, “if the only possible explanation for this dangerous behavior is the possibility that President Putin holds damaging information over President Trump.”
Other Democrats are further in front. Oregon Sen. Jeff Merkley said earlier on Monday that it’s “likely” that Putin has something on Trump, and that if it’s not the pee tape, then it’s “something close to that.” (We’ll resist the urge, for now, to speculate about what would be “close” to a pee tape.) Illinois Sen. Tammy Duckworth, meanwhile, speculated that Putin may have turned Trump “into a Russian asset.”
Is Money-Laundering the Forgotten Trump Kompromat? - The Atlantic
“I’ve felt all along in the Russia investigation that the most important issues were those that had the potential of exerting a continuing influence over the administration and over U.S. policy,” Representative Adam Schiff of California, the ranking Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee, told me Friday. “And if the Russians were laundering money through the Trump Organization, the Russians would know it, the president would know it, and that could be very powerful leverage.”
Trump gave us an indication of how he’d react in an interview today.
Putin is now saying, ‘It’s independent,’ a large section of Ukraine. I said, ‘How smart is that?’ And he’s gonna go in and be a peacekeeper… We could use that on our southern border. Here’s a guy who’s very savvy.