If Putin bet on Trump, he bet wrong
The Russians don't have a Manchurian candidate in the White House. They have a totally unpredictable wild card.
If the Russian government actively colluded with Donald Trump's presidential campaign to steal the election from Hillary Clinton — a claim of which I remain unconvinced — they are probably suffering from a serious case of buyer's remorse right about now.
The new sanctions on Russia handed down by the Republican Congress, and backed by President Trump, will be crippling for the Russian economy and hard on many American businesses as well (including Secretary of State Rex Tillerson's former employer). More important, the language of the sanctions puts Russia on the same level as Iran and North Korea as enemies of the United States rather than curmudgeonly partners whose quirks have to be navigated with care and sensitivity. The days when George W. Bush could say that he had looked into Vladimir Putin's soul and seen a fundamentally good man, a statesman with whom it was possible to do business, or when Barack Obama could mock Mitt Romney about stealing his Russia-antagonizing foreign policy from the '80s, are over.
It's easy to understand why Putin has responded to the U.S. Congress by drawing up counter-sanctions and expelling more than 700 American diplomatic personnel from Russia. Relations between the two countries are at their worst point since the Cold War; in its last years, the United States and Russia were actually getting along better, not least because they had clear shared objectives. In fact, it would hardly be a stretch to say that between the new sanctions and Vice President Mike Pence's recent speech following meetings with Baltic leaders about how our commitment to NATO is more necessary than ever in light of Russian aggression, the Cold War is back — and heating up very quickly.
Subscribe to The Week
Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.
Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
This cannot be what Putin and his agents had in mind when they decided to throw their weight behind the New York businessman who claimed to admire the Russian strongman.
Unless, of course, Trump and Putin are playing the longest of long games. But if Putin had planned on eventually getting the United States and its NATO allies off his back, and securing a more favorable trade relationship for his country with the world's largest economy, torpedoing even the possibility of diplomacy in the short term seems like a strange way of going about it.
Maybe he was double-crossed?
If that is the case, Putin is like millions of Americans who voted for Trump in the hope of electing someone who would not govern as a conventional Republican. Just as many people who had supported President Obama's re-election pulled the lever for Trump because they trusted him to be a prudent steward of our entitlement programs and a pragmatic job creator who would put full employment and the maintenance of infrastructure above conservative orthodoxy, anyone in Russia going out of his way to tip the scales for Trump must have been counting on the idea that he would be a moderate realist in foreign policy rather than a hawk in the mold of his Democratic opponent and lawmakers in the vanguard of his adopted party. Indeed, concern that Trump would be insufficiently committed to playing hardball with Russia and Iran was one of the reasons that Republican Sens. John McCain and Lindsey Graham were reluctant to lend support to their party's eventual nominee — and the hope that he would be more prudent was perhaps the only thing that Sen. Rand Paul, a dovish libertarian, liked about the man who had not long ago been an advocate of single-payer health care.
Of course, there is also the possibility that Trump, whether he and members of his campaign staff colluded or not, did intend to take a more conciliatory line with America's once and future enemy. Perhaps he has changed his mind, something not exactly out of keeping for a man for whom something like hiring a new communications director against the advice of his entire staff and then unceremoniously removing the new hire from his post after 10 days is standard operating procedure. It could be that conversations with his military advisers have changed his mind. Maybe he wants to throw a bone to Republicans in Congress in the hope of getting a more favorable hearing later on for his domestic agenda — assuming he still has one. Or maybe the whole thing is a cynical ploy to distract the press from his very real collusion with the Ruskies. None of these is mutually exclusive.
But the main takeaway is clear: The president of the United States is one of the least predictable men in the world. The question is whether that's a good thing.
Create an account with the same email registered to your subscription to unlock access.
Sign up for Today's Best Articles in your inbox
A free daily email with the biggest news stories of the day – and the best features from TheWeek.com
Matthew Walther is a national correspondent at The Week. His work has also appeared in First Things, The Spectator of London, The Catholic Herald, National Review, and other publications. He is currently writing a biography of the Rev. Montague Summers. He is also a Robert Novak Journalism Fellow.
-
Quiz of The Week: 27 April - 3 May
Puzzles and Quizzes Have you been paying attention to The Week's news?
By The Week Staff Published
-
'Protest charges unlikely to stick'
Today's Newspapers A roundup of the headlines from the US front pages
By The Week Staff Published
-
Universal donor blood is 'close' to reality
Under the Radar Scientists identify 'cocktail' of enzymes that destroy harmful antigens
By Rebecca Messina, The Week UK Published
-
Arizona court reinstates 1864 abortion ban
Speed Read The law makes all abortions illegal in the state except to save the mother's life
By Rafi Schwartz, The Week US Published
-
Trump, billions richer, is selling Bibles
Speed Read The former president is hawking a $60 "God Bless the USA Bible"
By Peter Weber, The Week US Published
-
The debate about Biden's age and mental fitness
In Depth Some critics argue Biden is too old to run again. Does the argument have merit?
By Grayson Quay Published
-
How would a second Trump presidency affect Britain?
Today's Big Question Re-election of Republican frontrunner could threaten UK security, warns former head of secret service
By Harriet Marsden, The Week UK Published
-
'Rwanda plan is less a deterrent and more a bluff'
Instant Opinion Opinion, comment and editorials of the day
By The Week UK Published
-
Henry Kissinger dies aged 100: a complicated legacy?
Talking Point Top US diplomat and Nobel Peace Prize winner remembered as both foreign policy genius and war criminal
By Harriet Marsden, The Week UK Last updated
-
Trump’s rhetoric: a shift to 'straight-up Nazi talk'
Why everyone's talking about Would-be president's sinister language is backed by an incendiary policy agenda, say commentators
By The Week UK Published
-
More covfefe: is the world ready for a second Donald Trump presidency?
Today's Big Question Republican's re-election would be a 'nightmare' scenario for Europe, Ukraine and the West
By Sorcha Bradley, The Week UK Published