This is written July 14, two days before the Helsinki summit between Presidents Trump and Putin, and everything is on schedule in very predictable fashion – according to script.
In the US, Rod Rosenstein has released "indictments" of 12 Russians who are accused of "hacking" Democratic National Committee servers other Democratic Party associated computers. These mysterious hackers are allegedly associated with the Russian government, for which there is not a shred of evidence. Right on cue, Schumer, Pelosi and other leading Democrats called on Trump to cancel his meeting with Putin. How lucky for them that these indictments came down precisely at this moment. It does not take a genius to understand that Rosenstein could have withheld them for a week so as not to undermine the President as he pursues Détente 2.0.
Likewise the discredited Skripal case has been thrust into the headlines again in good time for the summit. Even Greece, normally very friendly with Russia, expelled a few diplomats several days back due to the resurrection of l’affaire Skripal, thus jeopardizing an upcoming visit by Russian FM Lavrov.
Finally, Trump attended the NATO meetings to assure the "allies" that Putin of the taiga that they so fear would not frighten him. He even promised to hold fast to "obsolete" NATO if the Europeans provided more Euros for the Cold War behemoth now lumbering about from Afghanistan to Libya and beyond tearing up the place and killing innocents far and wide. In this way did Trump armor himself against the hawks.
And of course the pundits have been shrieking at the top of their lungs that Trump is disrupting the Cold War order. The air is thick with such emanations as Russian expert Stephen F. Cohen reminds us thus:
"As a rule, American presidents have departed for summits with bipartisan support and well-wishes. Trump’s upcoming meeting with Russian President Putin, in Helsinki on July 16, is profoundly different in two respects. US-Russian relations have rarely, if ever, been more dangerous. And never before has a president’s departure – in Trump’s case, first for a NATO summit and then the one with Putin – been accompanied by allegations that he is disloyal to the United States and thus cannot be trusted, defamations once issued only by extremist fringe elements in American politics. Now, however, we are told this daily by mainstream publications, broadcasts, and "think tanks." According to a representative of the Clintons’ Center for American Progress, "Trump is going to sell out America and its allies." The New York Times and The Washington Post also feature "experts" – they are chosen accordingly – who "worry" and "fear"that Trump and Putin "will get along." The Times of London, a bastion of Russophobic Cold War advocacy, captures the mainstream perspective in a single headline: "Fears Grow Over Prospect of Trump ‘Peace Deal’ with Putin."
An anti-"peace" Washington establishment is, of course, what still-unproven Russiagate allegations have wrought, as summed up by a New York magazine writer who advises us that the Trump-Putin summit may well be "less a negotiation between two heads of state than a meeting between a Russian-intelligence asset and his handler."
The roots and ramifications of this hysteria are explored by CJ Hopkins in the fashion they richly deserve in his essay "Hardcore Hitler on Hitler in Helsinki" here. And on it goes.
Amidst all this perfervid consternation Trump is enjoying a few rounds of golf in Scotland. He has also declared that Putin is a "competitor" but not an "enemy," a distinction the politically anencephalic Cold War set cannot grasp. But Trump continues to insist that it is a "good thing not a bad thing" for the US "to get along with Russia" – and China and North Korea and others. So Trump continues to stick with this motif from the 2016 campaign even though it eats up a lot of political capital and exposes him to the barrage of hysterical attacks outlined above. That is a sound sign that his declared intent is genuine.
The Russiagate witch hunt makes it nearly impossible for Trump to make concessions to Russia in return for concessions to us. Absent that, there is no way forward, no deals, no Détente 2.0. So the witch hunters are willing to risk nuclear confrontation to preserve the old Cold World Order or to indulge a blanket hatred for all things Trump. Such monsters do not deserve the time of day, let alone a vote, no matter whether they call themselves conservatives or liberals – and more of them seem to bear the liberal label these days.
This summit will present far more difficult political problems than did the Singapore meeting with Kim Jong-un. In Singapore all the interested parties wanted denuclearization of the Korean peninsula – Kim, Moon, the people of Korea, Trump, Xi and Putin, and even Abe. So to begin this deal was a no-brainer, and it is quite astonishing in retrospect that the previous administration failed to do so.
But the Summit poses great problems, because of the political pressures brought to bear on Putin and Trump. Each leader has hawks in his country opposing Détente 2.0. Trump’s are headquartered in the "Think" Tanks, the Dem Party Elite, the Main Stream Media, the Military Industrial Congressional Complex and the punditry associated with them all. Just as important is Israel which does not want peace with Iran, an ally of Russia. And unfortunately the space between the ears of virtually every US politician, with the exception of a few libertarians, is Israeli occupied territory, and its US Amen Corner stands careful watch over this prized conquest. The issue of Iran is therefore the Achilles heel of the struggle for Détente 2.0.
But in the midst of all the commotion let us not forget the stakes. According to the Stockholm International Peace and Research Institute, the US and Russia each have about 6500 – 7000 nuclear warheads with over 1600 on each side "deployed," that is placed on missiles or located on bases with operational forces. These are ready to go at a moment’s notice and cause suffering of a sort never before seen in human history, with the death of billions and perhaps the end of all human life, as Daniel Ellsberg informs us in chilling detail in The Doomsday Machine: Confessions of a Nuclear War Planner. The carpings of our hawks are as nothing compared to the opportunity to move out from under this nuclear cloud.
If this essay serves any purpose, it is to call more attention to the dangerous atmosphere being created by our media, the Dem pols and our "opinion shapers" in the lead up to the summit. A plan of action is in order. Complain like hell to every media outlet guilty of this disgraceful behavior. It only takes an email and the lords of the media, ever concerned about their bottom line, count them. Same with our hawkish pols.
And afterwards if the Summit does not take us in the direction of peace, complain like hell to the White House. But if the outcome of the Summit inches us away from Armageddon and toward Détente, as did the Singapore summit, have at the naysayers – they are standing in the way of our survival. And likewise praise to the skies a positive outcome. It is this attitude that the press is trying to prevent. Let them not instill in the populace a hatred of Trump that is stronger than the hatred of war.
John V. Walsh can be reached at John.Endwar@gmail.com.
