Moscow sticks to peace denials despite war exhaustion

In the forthcoming meeting with Trump, Putin may presume to have a position of strength or try to fake it to get a better deal in the hoped-for transactional bargaining. He reckons he knows his counterpart and counts on reproducing the special chemistry of meeting equals. Two very different characters are planning to test one another’s real strength from those that failed to reach a useful accord at the Helsinki summit in mid–July 2018. The crime of aggression has reduced Putin to one of the world’s rogues, who must be treated with care but cannot expect respect. Trump could force Putin to accept a compromise, but he does not need to. He has the option of sending Putin’s regime to the “ash heap of history,” much the same way as President Ronald Reagan condemned Soviet autocracy in June 1992.