Yes, I am sure he had it all figured out in advance - or maybe Zelensky did and he played Trump? Point of view tends to reinforce views rather than clarify them. Trump could have preached this as a win-win from day one rather than as a 500 billion dollar shakedown. Now, to many in the world - though never his unquestioning followers of course - he looks like he was bloviating. I again thank goodness for the presence of Kellogg in Kyiv for three days of hard constructive work.
But read the article and draw your own conclusions.
I don't care for the way Trump conducts himself either as I've stated before and you know. I can't recall if you've ever made any comments regarding General Patton on this thread, forgive me if I've missed them. But I see a number of parallels between the two in their personalities at least. I'm sure in many other ways they're different.
But Patton near as I can tell was a defiant self-glory seeking narcissist just as Trump. I would guess that if I had ever met the man I would've not liked him very much. But the fact is in light of what he accomplished, my opinion of how he conducted himself in doing so isn't worth a damn. What ultimately and only matters is his instrumental role in winning the war in Europe.
If this agreement turns out to be a win win as you described above, I do think it may be premature to say that at this point, does it really mean much of anything in how it came about? If the Ukrainians end up with a better economy, albeit at the expense of losing some of its land, if they get an implicit security improvement via the agreement with the U.S. and as we know already NATO has expanded it's borders, does it really matter how it was accomplished?
As far as ruffling the feathers of some of our NATO Allies goes, I think it was high time that happen. As has been noted many times the lack of funding many of those allies have put into defense and not living up to their agreements. I have no desire the USA to turn its back on NATO, but I'm quite sure those NATO allies just as strongly, likely more so, do not either.
Presumig we don't and NATO holds together as is and with an expanded presence, it would not surprise me if many of those allies think Trump was an a-hole while also being at peace in how this has worked out. So who gives a crap what they think of Trump?
