Trump-Putin: The romance and the booing
Vladimir Putin has accepted the 30-day ceasefire proposed by the US with a reluctance that reveals a certain fear: the fear that Ukraine will have time to rearm. We'll have to see what happens in the coming days, but it wouldn't be wrong to say that Putin has already failed, already lost, when the special military operation that was supposed to last a few weeks turned into a war lasting more than three years. Right now, the alliance with Donald Trump is the only chance he has left to complete that operation. Not as a victory, but at least as a geopolitical success marked by territorial annexations.
The influential Russian weekly Profile –a real one think tank—has suggested that the Kremlin take note of the transformations in the world and seek allies among non-Western countries. Profile makes it clear that Moscow must not give in to what it calls the "temptation of a romance with Washington."
There is no doubt that both Putin and Trump are nervous about suggestions of Profile, because they represent a further complication to the already complex relationship between the Russian and the American: first, a lifelong friendship; then, Trump's threats of tariffs if Russia didn't take the initiative to end the war; and then, when Putin bombed the Ukrainians for three days in a row, the American would say: "What else should he do if not seize the opportunity?"
An opportunity that arose precisely in the wake of the withdrawal of US military aid, which also meant not providing Kiev with intelligence information about the Kremlin's intentions. A chain of absurdities with the occasional boo that almost always ended with an unexpected and resounding compliment from Trump, like this one: "Putin is a generous man."
It should be added that if Profile advises the Kremlin to explore other geopolitical horizons because he doesn't trust anything that could happen in the US in the immediate future: analysts are not entirely sure where Trump's snobs and the gang surrounding him could lead. Some scenes from inside the cabinet are worthy of framing. Like when Secretary of State Marco Rubio, with a cross painted on his forehead to celebrate Ash Wednesday, boos "super minister" Elon Musk.The administration reform that Musk is leading It threatens to remove thousands of officials from key spheres, risking eroding the structure of the state. To the point that some observers see danger if this scenario were to be combined with the economic impulsiveness that the trade war could generate: the cracks could transform into real black holes. Hence Elon Musk's booing of Marco Rubio just hours after, look where, the burial of the sardine.
Loss of support
The support figures for the new administration are nowhere near as solid as they were a few weeks ago: 52% of Americans dislike Trump's approach, even though the traditional 100-day confidence threshold has yet to be met. The question is: will the internal checks and balances shift? Will there be a public backlash? Could the US institutional structure deteriorate? Perhaps Trump is Hitler in a different guise and in a different country, but it's clear that Hitler came to power because Weimar Germany was a decaying state. The US is a powerhouse now, but it wouldn't be immune to economic erosion and democratic discredit.