{"id":2259,"date":"2025-08-16T15:36:34","date_gmt":"2025-08-16T15:36:34","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/pronews.in\/index.php\/2025\/08\/16\/feeding-a-narcissist-ukraine-reflects-on-trump-putin-summit\/"},"modified":"2025-08-16T15:36:34","modified_gmt":"2025-08-16T15:36:34","slug":"feeding-a-narcissist-ukraine-reflects-on-trump-putin-summit","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/pronews.in\/index.php\/2025\/08\/16\/feeding-a-narcissist-ukraine-reflects-on-trump-putin-summit\/","title":{"rendered":"\u2018Feeding a narcissist:\u2019 Ukraine reflects on Trump-Putin summit"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

Kyiv, Ukraine \u2013<\/strong> The Alaska summit between United States President Donald Trump and his Russian counterpart, Vladimir Putin, was a masterclass in how a former intelligence officer uses his skills of manipulation on a self-centred narcissist.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s the impression a Kyiv-based political analyst who has closely followed the war with Russia got, they told Al Jazeera, after watching the interaction between Trump and Putin<\/a> during their summit on\u00a0Friday, which broke no ground in stopping Europe\u2019s hottest war since 1945.<\/p>\n

Putin \u201cworked [Trump] well\u201d, said the analyst who requested anonymity, referring to the years Putin spent as a Soviet spy in East Germany recruiting informants.<\/p>\n

On the tarmac at Elmendorf-Richardson, a Cold War-era airbase outside Alaska\u2019s capital, Anchorage, Putin greeted Trump with a \u201cgood morning, dear neighbour,\u201d referring to Alaska\u2019s proximity to northeastern Russia.<\/p>\n

Trump literally rolled out a red carpet for Putin, gave him a long handshake and a ride in \u201cThe Beast\u201d, the presidential limousine \u2013 and Putin beamed from the backseat.<\/p>\n

During a brief news conference, Putin kept thanking Trump, repeating and rephrasing what the American president had said about the talks, Ukraine and a possible peace settlement.<\/p>\n

Putin flattered Trump, including by backing the US leader\u2019s assertions \u2013 such as his claim that he could have prevented the Russian-Ukrainian war had he won the 2020 presidential vote instead of Joe Biden.<\/p>\n

\u201cToday, President Trump was saying that had he been president back then, there would be no war, and I\u2019m quite sure that it would indeed be so,\u201d the smiling Putin told reporters after the talks. \u201cI can confirm that.\u201d<\/p>\n

And it was Putin\u2019s manipulation masterfully disguised as saccharine flattery that ended the talks with Trump\u2019s conclusion that \u201cthere\u2019s no deal until there\u2019s a deal,\u201d Kucherenko said.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe fed the narcissist with whatever one needs to feed a narcissist into manipulating him \u2013 endless quotes, the endless \u2018how the American president said\u2019, endless appellations to the topics [Trump] is interested in,\u201d said the analyst, who has authored analytical reports on Russia\u2019s military and has addressed the US Congress in a hearing on the war.<\/p>\n

\u2018Nothing concrete\u2019<\/h2>\n

Putin\u2019s remarks at the news conference after the talks lasted for eight minutes and included a lecture on when czarist Russia owned Alaska<\/a> and how the Soviet and US militaries partnered during World War II.<\/p>\n

He spoke more than twice as long as Trump, who talked for only three minutes and admitted that the talks resulted in an agreement to hold more talks.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere were many, many points that we agreed on, most of them, I would say, a couple of big ones that we haven\u2019t quite gotten there, but we\u2019ve made some headway. So there\u2019s no deal until there\u2019s a deal,\u201d the US president said.<\/p>\n

Trump and Putin also refused to take questions.<\/p>\n

As a result, the summit ended with \u201cnothing concrete\u201d, Kucherenko said, as Putin said the \u201croot causes\u201d of the war should be addressed before any ceasefire or real steps towards a peace settlement are made.<\/p>\n

\u201cIn order to make the [future peace] settlement lasting and long term, we need to eliminate all the primary roots, the primary causes of that conflict, and we\u2019ve said it multiple times, to consider all legitimate concerns of Russia,\u201d Putin said.<\/p>\n

\u201cRoot causes\u201d is Putin\u2019s code for rejecting Ukraine\u2019s existence outside Moscow\u2019s political shadow and denying its very sovereignty.<\/p>\n

The China angle<\/h2>\n

However, the talks were not a total triumph for Putin, another Ukrainian observer said.<\/p>\n

They lasted for less than three hours instead of the seven that Russian officials had announced, and there was no bread broken over a joint lunch.<\/p>\n

And what was discussed behind closed doors went far beyond the war.<\/p>\n

\u201cRussia works through economy and geopolitics<\/a>, offers Trump profit here and now, and also haggles over the topic of containing China,\u201d Kyiv-based analyst Igar Tyshkevych told Al Jazeera.<\/p>\n

\u201cBased on that, the Kremlin is trying to gain political concessions that could help Russia confirm its ambitions for the status of a geopolitical centre, \u201d he said.<\/p>\n

\u201cAnd Ukraine is just a derivative part \u2013 an important but derivative one \u2013 of these processes,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

As the White House wants to prevent the fusion of Moscow\u2019s and Beijing\u2019s interests<\/a>, Trump finds it beneficial to negotiate business projects and political interactions with Moscow, Tyshkevych said.<\/p>\n

\u201cAs a result, the United States is not interested in a total defeat and a crisis for Russia. Alas for us,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

However, both Washington and Beijing wouldn\u2019t agree with boosting Moscow\u2019s geopolitical role to the status of a third global power, so the White House only \u201cpartially understands\u201d Putin\u2019s ambitions, he said.<\/p>\n

What\u2019s next?<\/h2>\n

For Ukraine, it all means more hostilities and attacks by Russian drones and missiles \u2013 while Moscow would boost mobilisation of men of fighting age, he said.<\/p>\n

One of Ukraine\u2019s pre-eminent military analysts, meanwhile, is pessimistic about the summit\u2019s outcomes.<\/p>\n

The very fact of a face-to-face with Trump on American soil means Putin was \u201clegitimised\u201d and raised from the role of a political pariah, Lieutenant General Ihor Romanenko, former deputy head of the Ukrainian military\u2019s General Staff, told Al Jazeera.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe was legitimised in an absolutely unacceptable way\u201d while being an \u201cinternational evil man who should be held responsible for his actions\u201d, Romanenko said.<\/p>\n

\u201cYet again, Trump didn\u2019t fulfil his promises about sanctions [on Russia], didn\u2019t reach a position on a ceasefire,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Ukraine, therefore, will have to continue its \u201ccomplicated fight until Trump grows his willpower and political will\u201d, the general said.<\/p>\n

Russia will accelerate its attempts to break through Ukraine\u2019s defence lines in the east and will resume its devastating air strikes with drones and missiles, he said.<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, Ukrainian authorities will need to make strategic decisions to start a \u201cfull and just\u201d mobilisation of men of fighting age and focus the economy on military needs, Romanenko said.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Kyiv, Ukraine \u2013 The Alaska summit between United States President Donald Trump and his Russian counterpart, Vladimir Putin, was a masterclass in how a former intelligence officer uses his skills of manipulation on a self-centred narcissist. That\u2019s the impression a Kyiv-based political analyst who has closely followed the war with Russia got, they told Al … Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2259","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/pronews.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2259","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/pronews.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/pronews.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pronews.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pronews.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2259"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/pronews.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2259\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/pronews.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2259"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pronews.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2259"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pronews.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2259"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}