The United States is meeting with Russia to discuss Ukraine. Not represented at the meeting is Ukraine nor is there any representation from Europe. This is old-school Great Power politics that is elevating Russia to a status it does not deserve both morally and materially. However, the Trump administration is affording the Putin regime a status boost while at the same time treating Ukraine like a vassal.
Welcome back to the pre-WWII way of doing global politics, without all of the unpleasant implications that brings to mind.
To add a little extra-authoritarian zing to the recipe, the talks are being in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.
The NYT reports, Rubio Lands in Saudi Arabia for Talks on Gaza and Ukraine.
Mr. Rubio is also scheduled to meet in Riyadh on Tuesday with Russian officials to discuss the future of the Russia-Ukraine war. They will be joined by two other key U.S. officials — Mike Waltz, the national security adviser, and Steve Witkoff, Mr. Trump’s Middle East envoy, who also works on Ukraine-Russia issues — according to Tammy Bruce, a State Department spokeswoman.
[…]
The moves prompted concern in Ukraine and elsewhere in Europe, where leaders fear being sidelined from discussions that will dictate their countries’ futures. Volodymyr Zelensky, the Ukrainian president, reiterated in an interview that aired on Sunday that his country would “never” accept a peace deal struck by the United States and Russia if Ukraine was not involved in the talks.
With this move, Trump is treating Putin like a legitimate equal and treating Ukraine as some kind of junior partner. And the more that the US is willing to deal directly with Russia while excluding Ukraine and our partners in Europe, the more Trump is validating Russia’s invasion in the first place. This is old-school power politics of the type that used to lead to wider, regional wars. Russia has already been trying to assert and normalize 19th-century-esque territorial acquisition for some time now, but the rest of the world has been resisting letting it be accepted as just something that countries do. The Trump administration is about to do just that (of course, since he has dreams of Greenland, Gaza, and the Panama Canal dancing around in its head, so be it, I guess).
Such a meeting is massively insulting to Ukraine, given it is their country and future that is at state, and our partners in Europe who have provided substantial aid to Ukraine and who have reasons not to want Russian influence and power to grow.
In the simplest of terms, we are treating Russia, which engaged in naked aggression, with more respect than we showed our NATO allies last week. And we are treating Ukraine like a child in a dispute between adults.
Indeed, the NYT further reports: European Leaders Meet in Paris as U.S. Pushes Ahead With Ukraine Plan.
The leaders of many of Europe’s biggest countries on Monday will descend on Paris in an effort to forge a strategy for their own security as President Trump’s envoys prepared for talks with Russia over ending the war in Ukraine without them.
The meeting in Paris was pulled together rapidly, after Vice President JD Vance’s scathing speech in Munich criticizing Europe’s exclusion of far-right groups from power and the fast-emerging American plans to begin peace talks with Russia in Saudi Arabia this week, without the presence of Ukrainian or European leaders.
Expected in Paris are leaders from Germany, Britain, Italy, Poland, Spain, the Netherlands and Denmark, as well as the president of the European Council, the president of the European Commission and the secretary general of NATO.
We are driving allies away (indeed, bringing into question decades-old friendships) while enhancing the power of Russia. It is an insane set of maneuvers if one is trying to enhance US power and influence.
It is also worth noting that Rubio is going to discuss Trump’s ethnic cleansing plan (I find the NYT‘s characterization to be inaccurate) with there are as well (in case anyone was hoping that the notion would just be confined to that press conference).
From the first linked NYT piece.
Mr. Rubio, who flew to Riyadh from Israel, was expected to press the Saudi leadership to propose a vision for postwar Gaza. President Trump’s idea to depopulate and occupy the territory has spurred widespread opposition in the Arab world, including in Saudi Arabia. That has led Mr. Rubio and other U.S. officials to encourage Arab leaders to suggest an alternative.
I noted at some point that one of the reasons that Trump could put a fairly standard pick in the Secretary of State slot is because, as president, he could more directly drive foreign policy than any of the other cabinet-level areas. We are seeing this in real-time. See, also, Politico Magazine: This is Not Marco Rubio’s State Department.
It is becoming increasingly clear that Marco Rubio is secretary of State in name only.
Since taking over Foggy Bottom, Rubio has constantly appeared one or two steps behind the actions of President Donald Trump and tech mogul Elon Musk — popping up to explain, justify or even double down on choices he probably would not make if he was actually running the show. He’s talking (and posting online) in a different voice, contradicting earlier policy views and appears to have little control over the implementation of Trump’s assault on the federal workforce.
For example, on Trump’s Gaza plans he has said the following (source).
Mr. Trump has “been very bold about what the future for Gaza should be, not the same tired ideas of the past,” Mr. Rubio said in prepared remarks delivered alongside Mr. Netanyahu on Sunday after the two met privately. “It may have shocked and surprised many, but what cannot continue is the same cycle where we repeat over and over again and wind up in the exact same place.”
“Little Marco,” indeed.
