Just two years after working to put Donald Trump in the White House, Russian leader Vladimir Putin is now getting help from Trump to achieve foreign policy objectives that Russia has sought for years.
Trump has loudly criticized the NATO military alliance as unduly burdensome for the United States. He has started a trade war with many of those same allies. And on his way to the G-7 summit of industrialized democracies Friday morning, he suggested that those nations re-admit Russia to the gathering ― even though Russia continues to occupy part of Ukraine, the reason it was expelled from the group in the first place.
“If this were a screenplay, Hollywood would have thrown it out as too ridiculous,” said Tom Nichols, a Russia expert at the Naval War College. “I can’t think of anybody who thinks this is a good idea.”
“Today crystallizes precisely why Putin was so eager to see Trump elected,” said Ned Price, a former CIA analyst and the National Security Council spokesman under then-President Barack Obama. “For Putin, this is return on his investment, and it’s safe to say that his investment has paid off beyond even his wildest dreams.”
On his way from the White House to a Marine helicopter waiting on the South Lawn, Trump told reporters that Putin probably wished that Democrat Hillary Clinton had been elected president rather than him. He has offered this comment many times before, notwithstanding a U.S. intelligence community assessment that Putin interfered in the election with the goal of helping Trump win.
“I have been Russia’s worst nightmare,” Trump boasted. “But with that being said, Russia should be in this meeting. Why are we having a meeting without Russia being in the meeting? And I would recommend, and it’s up to them, but Russia should be in the meeting. They should be a part of it. You know, whether you like it or not ― and it may not be politically correct ― but we have a world to run. And in the G-7, which used to be the G-8, they threw Russia out. They should let Russia come back in. Because we should have Russia at the negotiating table.”
Steven Pifer, a U.S. ambassador to Ukraine under President Bill Clinton, said to bring Russia back into the G-7 would be to reward Putin’s military aggression. “Russia was booted after it seized and illegally annexed Crimea. It went on to spark a conflict in eastern Ukraine that has killed more than 10,000. That should not win Moscow an invitation back to the G-8 table,” Pifer said.
