Maybe Trump is not being deceived by Putin but is rather deceiving us all

From Fortune / Yahoo!News:

"Is Putin playing Trump or is Trump playing us?

Jeffrey Sonnenfeld, Steven Tian, August 31, 2025

 

With this week’s Russian missile and drone onslaught across Ukraine, which included the largest bombardment of Kyiv since February 2022 — it’s clear that despite President Donald Trump’s claims that he would be able to end the conflict quickly, we are still far away from an end to Vladimir Putin’s. A cease-fire remains elusive, despite Trump signaling one in Alaska last month — and threatening Putin with vague “severe consequences” if it failed to take place. 

 

Russian sanctions under President Biden were substantial, but they were insufficient and underenforced, and military supply deliveries were often tardy. Still, that Administration’s rhetoric and actions were consistent in support for Ukraine. Disturbingly, despite occasional tough talk from Trump which we have saluted over the past eight months, it seems he is unwilling to exert any actual leverage on Putin. Trump has had all the cards and dropped the deck as Putin’s imploding economy leaves Russia far from being an economic superpower. Other world leaders now wonder if he is all bark and no bite.

 

Once again, top Trump officials are denouncing the attacks as “egregious” and that they “threaten the peace” Trump is pursuing, yet Trump refuses to take any substantive action to pressure Putin to stop or to punish Putin for his transgression. Trump must surely know that a verbal wrist slap is unlikely to stop the Russian dictator. Similarly, before the Alaska Summit, Trump had threatened new sanctions and tariffs on Russia if Putin did not agree to end the war in Ukraine, but no such sanctions and tariffs have been imposed since. Where are those long-promised sanctions and tariffs?

Likewise, sometimes Trump verbally muses about strengthening support for Ukraine — such as when he posted to Truth Social, speculating about whether Ukraine should be allowed to strike deep within Russia — but his actions consistently fail to match his rhetoric, as U.S. aid to Ukraine draws down and Europe increasingly foots the bill.

There is a striking disconnect between what Trump is saying and what he is doing — and every time, Trump does not match his rhetorical bellicosity with any actual action or pressure on Putin, as Putin continues unabated.

Is Putin playing Trump, promising progress in a peace deal which will never come to buy more time to batter Ukraine? Or is Trump playing us, dangling vague assurances while letting Putin get away with it?

The biggest winner

Regardless, it’s clear who the biggest winner is from Trump’s inability to deliver the peace deal he has long promised: Putin wins, and everyone else loses. Each and every single day the war goes on, Russia continues to gain more land and kill more Ukrainians, helped by the fact that U.S. assistance for Ukraine is dwindling as Ukraine runs low on munitions. As former U.S. Ambassador to Russia Mike McFaul pointed out, there is no doubt that “since President Trump has been in the White House, Putin has gotten more aggressive. There have been more attacks on Ukrainian civilians, and the number of drone and missile attacks have gone up.”

There is much that Trump can do to pressure Putin if he chooses to do so — much of which he himself has threatened or mused about, but failed to act upon. Perhaps the most potent leverage would be tightening economic pressure on Putin through sanctions and tariffs. While the secondary tariffs recently levied on India for buying Russian oil is a good first step, that is just the tip of the iceberg, with countries such as China, Turkey, and others continuing to buy ample Russian oil providing windfall revenues for Putin. By tightening the screws on Putin’s already crumbling economic house of cards, Putin could run out of money very soon — perhaps even by the end of the year. There is ample congressional traction for this, including the “Sanctioning Russia Act of 2025” legislation co-sponsored by Senators Lindsey Graham and Richard Blumenthal, which would impose secondary tariffs and sanctions on countries which continue to fund Russia’s war machine...

Some were alarmed by reports that mid-tier functionaries at Exxon have been engaged in backchannel discussions with Rosneft. This was a failed diplomatic ruse truly little more than cosmetic moves dangling before Putin into the unlikely prospect of “normalized” relations with the U.S. after the war ends. Putin saw through this insincere U.S. tactic. The reality is, as Exxon insiders have confirmed to me, Exxon has little appetite for unreliable Russian oil. Exxon has no incentive to become hostage to Putin’s mercurial whims while incurring massive global reputational risk holds little appeal. It is plainly uneconomic to drill in the Russian Arctic Circle, with a much higher marginal cost of production than far cheaper and more reliable oilfields in Guyana, the Middle East, and the Permian Basin in the U.S.

The U.S. business contingent to Alaska was cosmetic Trump appeasement for Russian talks to tantalize Putin — or fool the public. In reality, they have no need for that added supply and cannot afford the drilling in the Arctic Circle anymore. It proved uneconomic under Rex Tillerson, but the Ukrainian invasion gave them an excuse to withdraw — along with BP and Shell. Russia has periodically threatened litigation and even sued its former partner Exxon as US technology is vital to assist the anachronistic inefficient Russian extraction systems which cost twice as much as for other OPEC+ nations...

As an added kicker, it is plain disorienting, if not dizzying, to have to deal with a constantly changing cast of interlocutors, with successive waves of top executives at Russian energy firms somehow committing suicide during Putin’s term. This includes figures at Gazprom, Lukoil, Transneft and Rosneft who have mysteriously fallen out of windows, somehow committed suicide by shooting themselves five times in the back, or accidentally getting run over by cars.

Simultaneously, Trump has to fortify military assistance for Ukraine. Already, there is growing momentum in Congress, including from Trump’s GOP allies, for another major military aid package to help Ukraine, despite the misguided cries of outnumbered, outgunned isolationists such as JD Vance not to support Ukraine anymore. Already, there is a bipartisan proposal in the Senate for a new $54.6 billion package in new aid to Ukraine, which would be the largest aid package for Ukraine yet.

Despite Trump’s tough talk, he constantly fails to match his rhetorical bluster with genuine action to squeeze Putin. Trump, who normally enjoys creating maximum leverage for himself, seems bizarrely unwilling or unable to challenge Putin beyond verbal wordplay. Where are the “severe consequences” against Putin that Trump has often threatened, but never implemented?

It’s not too late to change that — if things continue at this rate, it will be hard to say whether Putin is playing Trump, or Trump is playing us. Either way, the U.S., the EU, and Ukraine are all worse off under Trump’s confusing cowardice."