President Donald Trump was no match for Russia's Vladimir Putin when they met at the summit in Alaska last week, argued Maggie Haberman of The New York Times on CNN Monday evening — in part because Putin turned out far more unyielding in his demands.
This comes as Trump also hosted several European leaders, who did their best to re-sell him on preserving America's commitment to the security of Ukraine and of NATO.
"When you and I spoke ... about the summit. You had pointed to something that President Trump had said on the plane on the way to the summit, which was about the security guarantees and indicating that there could be some sort of middle ground between the U.S. providing security guarantees and European countries," said anchor Anderson Cooper. "It seems like that's where the president's head is at, though it's unclear what that may mean ... coordination of European security guarantees, right?"
"I think we still don't know what the dynamics of this are going to be," said Haberman. "But yes, what he is talking about today is roughly what my understanding was on Friday of where he thought this might be, and that was the new piece of this."
"He has been opposed to any kind of security guarantee involving the U.S. before, but again, 'involved' is kind of a fluid term here," Haberman continued. "I don't think that he actually — despite the fact that he didn't rule out troops on the ground, U.S. troops, I don't think that's actually where he wants to go. I do think it will be something more like a circuitous, you know, continuing to sell arms to European nations that are then earmarked for Ukraine. I think there actually already is a component of that, whether that is going to be enough to get to a deal."
"I mean, you know, President Trump began the day by saying the onus is on [Ukrainian] President Zelenskyy to just, he could end this war," she added. "But actually, that's really not who it's up to. There is this other person, Vladimir Putin, who, as good as Donald Trump is at standing still and saying, you have to come to my terms, Putin is actually better at that."
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