'Startling': Conservative slams Trump for tearing down all U.S. challenges to Putin

President Donald Trump has brought about an alarming retreat from American values on the world stage, in ways that all seem to empower Russia and Vladimir Putin, wrote conservative analyst Max Boot in a scathing column for The Washington Post published on Monday.

"Unrestrained by any administration 'adults,' Trump is executing what may be the most startling U-turn in the history of U.S. foreign policy," wrote Boot, a frequent critic of the president. Specifically, he is trying to align America with the Kremlin, something that has been diametrically opposed to U.S. interests since 1917.

"Trump has ended funding for the National Endowment for Democracy, which the Kremlin hates because it supports groups that expose Putin’s tyranny and corruption," wrote Boot. "He has cut off offensive cyber-operations against Russia. He voted with Russia (and such rogue regimes as North Korea and Belarus) at the United Nations against a resolution censuring Russia for its invasion of Ukraine. He has said he won’t defend NATO nations that supposedly don’t pay enough for defense. (Most NATO members now meet its target of spending 2 percent of gross domestic product on defense, but Trump is shifting the goal posts by demanding 5 percent of GDP — well beyond the 3.4 percent that the United States itself spends.)"

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Meanwhile, Trump has turned on Ukraine after our country spent years arming and defending them against a brutal Russian invasion, even turning off intelligence sharing — something so drastic even some voices on Fox News condemned it. This shutoff has enabled Russian soldiers to advance in the Kursk region, making gains where previously they were on the back foot.

And this is without even mentioning the public reaming Trump gave Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky in the Oval Office, stunning U.S. allies and forcing them to rethink their relationships with America.

"I have given up trying to figure out the nature of Trump’s bond with Putin. Is it simply 'autocrat envy'? Is Putin the strongman he aspires to be? Is he still hoping to build a Trump Tower in Moscow? Is it gratitude for the help Putin gave him in 2016? Or is there something more sinister going on?" wrote Boot. "I don’t know. But I do know that Trump has reoriented U.S. policy in a pro-Moscow direction — and for no good reason. As retired Australian Maj. Gen. Mick Ryan wrote on Substack last week, 'The Trump-Musk-MAGA regime is now acting as an ally of Russia.'"