As Trump is meeting Putin tomorrow I am not holding my breath for some historic breakthrough. This is because Russians aren't interested in ending the war on anybody else's but their own terms – even though they wouldn't mind ending it at all, given the pain they endure.
Being Russians, they only understand the limits imposed by brute force. They can endure suffering even if their progress is minuscule and costs billions of dollars and thousands of lives of their own soldiers.
For that reason it's hard to understand Trump's frustration with the slow progress of his efforts to end the war in Ukraine quickly. After all, his failures have been needlessly been self-inflicted, despite the fact that he has had the right plan to achieve peace since at least mid-2024, even before the presidential election
And yet, even after returning to the White House, he has yet to implement it in full.
What's worse, in recent months he has cornered himself with his boorish behaviour and it's going to be difficult for him to find a way out without losing face.
