After returning from Alaska on Saturday, Vladimir Putin told top officials assembled in the Kremlin that his summit with Donald Trump had “brought us closer to the necessary solutions”.
Those solutions, Putin stressed, involve Ukraine’s capitulation to the maximalist demands that prompted his 2022 invasion. “Settling these root causes [for the war] must be the foundation for a settlement,” he said.
The extraordinary meeting at Anchorage’s Elmendorf Air Force base has ended Putin’s pariah status and brought Washington’s stance on the war closer to Moscow’s.
And Putin did not need to budge an inch.
It was to put pressure on Ukraine and Europe and to make them look like warmongers, when muskovites are reasonable and just want to end this war.
It is amazing that this optic even exists, let alone that it is popular with millions of people.
Propaganda works. And it works especially well on stupid people.