The Wall Street Journal's conservative editorial board slammed last week's Trump-Putin summit in a new op-ed published on Sunday.
President Donald Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin met in Anchorage, Alaska, on Friday to negotiate an end to the war in Ukraine. While no deal was reached at the summit, the Wall Street Journal's editorial board saw glimpses of how adversaries like Putin are using Trump's ambitions to avoid a peace deal.
"Mr. Trump has made his role as a peacemaker a major theme of his second term, and it’s an admirable ambition," the op-ed reads in part. "But the question is, as always, peace at what price? Cunning adversaries like Mr. Putin and China’s Xi Jinping can sense when the desire for a Nobel Peace Prize can be exploited for far more substantive strategic gains."
Putin has been an international pariah since he invaded Ukraine in 2022. The European Union has largely shut off its imports of Russian oil, which is a key driver of the country's economy. Similarly, the U.S. has imposed near-crippling sanctions on Russia since the war began.
However, none of that seemed to matter following the Trump-Putin summit, according to the WSJ's editorial board.
"Their President ended his isolation in the West, made no public concessions, and can continue killing Ukrainians without further sanction," the column continues.
Going forward, the prospect of peace in Ukraine seems to hinge on Trump's next moves.
"Maybe they can counter Mr. Putin’s lies about who started the war and the security guarantees required to end it," the op-ed added. "But the reality is that no one knows what the U.S. President will do or say."