After 16 months in office, 72-year-old President Donald Trump will finally summit in Helsinki July 16 with Russian President Vladimir Putin. Russian hysteria on Capitol Hill, blaming Putin for meddling in the 2016 election to favor Trump, has made U.S.-Russian diplomacy all but impossible. Democrats and their media friends have accused Trump of colluding with Russian to gain unfair advantage in the 2016 presidential election. While there’s zero proof that the Kremlin helped elect Trump, the narrative continues with Democrats and the U.S. press. Special Counsel Robert Mueller, appointed May 17, 2017 by Deputy Atty. Gen. Rod Rosenstein, has not turned up any proof that such collusion took place. Only today, Trump repeated that Putin does not believe Russia meddled in the U.S. election, prompting Democrats and the press to denounce Trump.
All the finger-pointing at Russia on Capital Hill has made it next to impossible for Trump to meet a campaign promise to improve ties with the Russian Federation. When Trump suggests he wants to summit with Putin, Democrats and the press accuse Trump of cozying up to dictators. When former President Barack Obama left office, Jan. 20, 2017, U.S.-Russian relations had deteriorated to Cold War levels Trump promised to improve relations—but every time he suggests meeting with Putin, he’s accused by Democrats and the press of collusion. Despite opposition to the meeting, Trump sent National Security Adviser John Bolton to Moscow to meet with Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov to set up the meeting. Meeting July 16 gives Putin the chance to attend closing ceremonies in Moscow for the 2018 World Cup. Meeting with Putin, Trump can repair much of the damage under Obama.
Before Trump meets with Putin July 16, he’ll attend a NATO summit in London July 11, 12, reassuring U.S. allies of his commitment to the Western alliance. When Trump criticized NATO, it had nothing to do with U.S. commitment to the Western alliance. Trump simply wanted NATO allies to pay its fair share of the costs for their defense, not expect the U.S. to foot the whole bill. For that, Democrats and the press accused Trump of abandoning traditional U.S. allies. NATO partners in the Baltics, including, Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia express concerns about Russia’s aggressive military posture. When Putin invaded Crimea March 1, 2014, it threw NATO for a loop, considering the Feb. 22, 2014 anti-Kremlin coup that took place in Kiev. Putin accused the U.S. CIA of backing the revolt that watched Kremlin-backed Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych ousted from Kiev.
Meeting in Helsinki, where President Gerald Ford met with Russian Premier Leonid Brezhnev, where former President George H.W. Bush met with Premier Mikhail Gorbachev in 1990 and where former President Bill Clinto met with Russian President Boris Yeltsin in 1997, offers Trump a dramatic Cold War backdrop. Russian Amb. Vassily Nebenzia looks forward to the two super-power leaders meeting July 16. “We will not be able to avoid” the civil war in Syria, Crimea, the Ukraine, North Korea and Iran said Nebenzia. “We need each other, not because we ant to love each other. We don’t want and don’t need to be loved. We simply need to hold normal, pragmatic relations with a major country upon which—the like what he’s upon us—a lot in the world depends,” said Nebenzia. Both Russia and the U.S. stand to gain from improving bilateral relations.
Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) questioned whether Trump would be tough enough on Putin, considering Syria’s new attacks on U.S.-backed rebels in the South.. “The question is are we going to let Putin walk all over us? Had eight years of that, kind of tired out it,” said Graham, a member of the Senate Armed Services Committee. Graham’s been one of Trump’s biggest GOP critics on Capitol Hill but shows signs of coming around lately. Trump needs support for the upcoming summit with Putin from Capitol Hill, not more Cold War rhetoric. When Trump met with North Korean Dictator Kim Jong-un June 12, he defused tensions on the Korean Peninsula. Democrats and the press gave Trump no credit, only criticized him for not getting more results. No other U.S. president had ever met with a North Korean dictator. Now the press shows the same sour grapes as Trump meets Putin face-to-face in Helsinki.
Unlike Democrats and the U.S. press, Finish President Sauli Niinisto hoped the meeting would relax tensions in Poland and the Baltics. “Even small steps in reducing tensions would be in everybody’s interest,” said Niinisto, looking forward to hosting the meeting. All indications point toward Trump and Putin holding productive talks, dealing with pressing regional and global issues. Whether Trump gets Putin to return Crimea to Ukraine isn’t likely. But discussing a whole range of global topics looks all but certain. “Russia continues to say they had nothing to do with meddling in our election,” Trump tweeted before announcing the July 16 summit in Helsinki. Instead of Democrats and the press stirring the pot, they should wish Trump well negotiating for the U.S. and the Western Alliance. Meeting with Putin promises to give Trump more credibility and stature on the world stage.
