NEW WORLD ORDER?

As expected, Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin concluded their first full-fledged meeting without any serious agreements, but this event will perhaps be remembered in history because many representatives of the American political establishment put forward unprecedentedly severe accusations against the U.S. President. The criticism was so large that it eclipsed the summit to some extent.

Harsh criticism of Trump

Helsinki was chosen as a venue of the summit because it has been traditionally considered a neutral territory, although Finland often gravitates towards the West, the EU and NATO. When the world's leading media outlets reported from Helsinki, they certainly could not ignore the historical parallels - this is the same place where Mikhail Gorbachev and George Bush Sr. started the process later known as the beginning of “détente” in international relations, as well as the complete defeat of the Soviet position in the Cold War.

This time, however, most American politicians, media representatives and experts believe that the U.S. was the losing party of negotiations. Trump’s opponents in Washington became remarkably obstreperous after his visit to the UK and to the NATO summit, where he criticized Theresa May, Angela Merkel, and the entire Alliance in general. But the biggest moment of rage was during a joint press conference with Putin, when Trump answered the questions about Russia's possible intervention in the U.S. presidential election in 2016, as well as about the charges that the U.S. brought against 12 officers of the GRU just before the summit. President Trump said literally the following: “President Putin says it was not Russia. I do not see any reason why it would be.” Later, at the White House, Trump said that he was inaccurate in his reply and that he actually meant that there was no reason to believe that Moscow did not intervene. The president also added that he fully trusted the U.S. intelligence. But it was already late. Especially considering that a few hours before the start of the meeting in Helsinki, Trump twitted that relations between Moscow and Washington deteriorated “because of foolishness and stupidity” of the former U.S. leadership. During the actual meeting, the American leader praised the World Cup, which ended a day before in Russia calling it one of the best competitions ever. That was more than enough.

Even Trump’s supporters began criticizing him for such revelations, let alone his opponents. John Brennan, the former director of the CIA, called Trump's speech in Helsinki “a betrayal,” and his comments “imbecile.” According to Brennan, now the U.S. president is “in Putin's pocket”. Republican senator Bob Corker, who leads the Foreign Relations Committee of the Senate, said he was sad that Trump could ever question the findings of the intelligence during a joint press conference with Putin. Leader of the Democrats in the Senate, Chuck Schumer, accused Trump in “siding with Putin,” and in his opinion, such a position is “irresponsible, dangerous and weak.” Congressman Adam Schiff (D) described the words of the U.S. president as “cowardly and shameful.” Senator John McCain (R) believes that Trump's speech at the press conference with Putin is “one of the most shameful statements by American presidents in history.” Leader of the Democratic minority of the House of Representatives Nancy Pelosi is sure that the meeting in Helsinki is “a sad day for America and for all Western democracies”. Arizona Republican senator Jeff Flake admitted that he did not believe that the U.S. president would “stand next to Russia and blame the U.S. for Russian aggression.” “Donald Trump, you looked weak in the eyes of Putin and the world. Putin respects force,” the former U.S. Ambassador to Russia Michael McFaul wrote on his Twitter account. Columnists of the New York Times, Washington Post, etc. used similar expressions calling Trump a puppet of Putin, his fan, or a traitor. The situation aggravated so much that a number of American officials called for actual interrogation of Trump’s interpreter in the Congress. “We need to understand what they discussed in private, what Trump told Putin and promised him,” said Sen. Gene Shahin (NH) and Congressman Joe Kennedy III. There were even claims that the incumbent U.S. president has been a Russian agent since 1987. American media revealed that Trump's business trips to Russia began in 1987, during the Soviet times, which means he certainly could not do without the escort of Soviet special services.

It is remarkable that according to the results of poll conducted by The Wall Street Journal and NBC, more than half of Americans (51%) also did not approve Trump’s actions at the meeting with Putin either. At the same time, 65% of Americans believe that Russia interfered in the pre-election campaign. Up to 30% of respondents believe that Russia's interference was in favour of Trump.

Trump responded to criticism in his usual style: “Some people hate the fact that I got along well with President Putin of Russia. They would rather go to war than see this. It’s called Trump Derangement Syndrome!”. Then he warned: “When you hear the fake news... that I handed over everything, remember, I did not give anything away, we just talked about future benefits for both countries.” He also said that he was ready to take political risks for the sake of peace, but was not ready to risk the peace because of domestic policy, and, despite a flurry of criticism, invited Putin to visit Washington in autumn. But Trump did not stop there either suggesting a possible “Russian interference” to support the Democratic Party in the upcoming Congressional elections in autumn. The observers called this the political outrage and trolling of the democrats. Interim elections to the Congress will be held on November 6, when the House of Representatives (the lower house of the Congress) and 35 members of the Senate (the upper house) will be re-elected together with the governors of several states and heads of territories. It is expected that the Republican Party will not have good results in this election.

Putin spoke again

In Russia, the media coverage of the Helsinki summit was exclusively positive given that this news fit very well with the successful holding of the World Cup. “It's gorgeous, better than super,” Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said about the results of the summit and his separate meeting with the U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo. These words conveyed a general mood in Russia. According to most observers, Putin needed a platform and an audience to express his point of view once more, and he did it. And not only during a joint press conference, but also during an interview with Chris Wallace of Fox News. Wallace later admitted that Putin's team agreed for the interview with a single condition – it must be broadcasted in full. (Interestingly, Wallace took a vacation and went with his wife to rest... in Russia immediately after the release of his interview).

Questions to Putin also mainly concerned Russian meddling in American elections. But according to Putin, it is simple ridiculous to think that “it was possible to intervene in the U.S. elections from the territory of the Russian Federation and influence the choice of millions of Americans”. Apparently, Putin intentionally confused several times the name of the special prosecutor Mueller, whom he is ready to provide access to the GRU officers “only if Russia is provided access to the head of the Hermitage Capital Foundation, William Browder” (a case about the theft of millions of dollars from Russia). It is remarkable that Putin finally recognised the desirability of Trump's victory, “because he advocated the normalization of relations.” However, both during the press conference and later during the interview, Putin underlined several times that before the election neither himself nor the Russian special services were interested in Trump personally. That when Trump visited Moscow as “just a billionaire” back in 2013, Putin did not even know about it. “We do not and cannot have compromising evidence [against Mr. Trump]. I don't want to insult President Trump when I say this — and I may come [across] as rude — but before he announced that he will run for [the] presidency, he was of no interest for us. Nobody could ever imagine that he would be the President of the United States.”

Wallace also asked Putin questions about the new Russian weapons presented personally by Putin in March, and, of course, about Syria. By the way, during the joint press conference Moscow tied the Middle East war to the ongoing events in this Arab republic. Putin also took from somewhere a ball of the World Cup and presented it to his American counterpart when he was asked about the World Cup 2018 in Russia. It seemed a symbolical transfer of the initiative on the Syrian settlement to the American side. Trump took the ball... and promised to give it to his son. At the same time, Republican senator from South Carolina Lindsay Graham advised his president to carefully check this ball on “bugs” and never bring it to the White House.

Obvious paradox

Obviously, it is very difficult to talk about Russian-American relations at this time and in this context. The situation is indeed unprecedented. It's hard to get rid of the feeling that many representatives of the American political establishment have much more hostility and suspicion toward their president than to Putin and Russia. On the one hand, Trump is suspected of connections with Moscow and acting in Russia’s favour. He is also accused of showing much greater respect to the Russian president than to his immediate allies. On the other hand, such tough attacks on Trump from not only allies but also family members automatically play in Putin’s hand. Certainly, the critics of Trump understand this very well. After all, the Trump administration has not made any concessions to the Kremlin neither on Syria, nor on Ukraine or on sanctions. On the contrary, Trump even criticized Germany for the Nord Stream-2. As for the summit of the two presidents, it ended without the signing of final document. Even at the rise of the Cold War, American leaders would meet with Soviet leaders like Roosevelt met with Stalin because both then and now there are issues of global security, which must be constantly maintained in a state of dialogue. There is no other way to solve them. And this is also perfectly understood by everyone.

Immediately after the Helsinki summit, many of the prestigious publications came out with crying out headlines: “Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin want to create a new world order” (Financial Times), “Trump’s step toward Putin seals a new world order” (Politico), or “Trump reorganizes the world order” (The Guardian). The general essence of most publications boils down to the fact that the liberal world order and the positions of the trans-Atlantic alliance are now under threat. At the same time, most of these media outlets emphasize that Russian GDP “is less than 10% of the U.S. or European Union's GDP” or that “Russia's GDP is $1.58 trillion, which is comparable to GDP of the state of New York with its environs.” They also bring forward such problems of Russia as dependence on the export of energy resources and the demographic crisis. What kind of partnership with Moscow is possible then to demolish the existing world economic and political system? If Trump's critics reacted to the Helsinki summit in ordinary and calm manner, then they would be more consistent. As it would be much more interesting to discuss and comment on the views of Moscow and Washington on Syria, Iran, North Korea, China, and Ukraine. But in terms of percentage, these topics were given insignificant consideration compared to the Russiagate. In fact, no one knows what Trump and Putin discussed behind the closed doors.

Therefore, the ongoing events may hardly be called the issues of Russian-American relations. Rather they are about the relations between the U.S. and the EU, within NATO and, most importantly, the US domestic policy. The U.S. is experiencing something that it has never had since the founding of this state. Still we hope that after the elections in November elections the situation will become clearer.