Buffer zone for Ukraine is a nonsense

The Europeans seem to be getting increasingly desperate with their ideas for a post-war solution for Ukraine. First of all, there is absolutely no sign yet of a post-war situation. Putin wants to carry on the war for as long as he can which could be years. Second, the European idea of setting up a buffer zone between Russian-occupied land and the rest of Ukraine with thousands of peacekeeping-style troops from other countries, is impractical, unrealisable and naive. That wold be a huge area to cover, and the maximum number of troops being envisaged, roughly 60,000, would not cut it. Their role would he impossible to enforce and could lead to a dangerous confrontation with Russian troops. Then what? It beats me why all the clever military commanders around in Europe, and I'm including Brexit Britain here, don't point this all out. Or are they so gungho that they believe something like this could actually work? Putin won't agree to having Nato troops in Ukraine, ever. So if British troops were sent would they have to wear a UN beret or, God forbid, a European Army beret? No one will be fooled by that, least of all Putin. But the whole concept is beyond credibility, unless the buffer zone is protected by, say, 150,000-200,000 troops. But who is going to provide that size force from Europe? And how long would they have to stay there? Twenty, thirty, forty years? It's totally impractical.

The latest Trump-style arms deal to Ukraine

It's one of those deals which only someone like Donald Trump could have negotiated. Under the latest arms scheme for Ukraine which was announced some weeks ago but is now actually happening, the US is selling warfighting weapons to Europe in order for the Europeans to give them to Ukraine. It's a huge boost for US defence companies at no cost to the American taxpayer, because Europe is paying all the bills. It's an extraordinary arrangement, because Trump can also claim that the US is no longer arming Ukraine,even though it patently is. Putin won't be fooled but it really is quite clever. The first batch of US air-launched long-range cruise missiles have just been sent to the Ukrainian air force but via the bill payers which in this case are Denmark and The Netherlands. Total amount is $825 million so it's not a sneeze. Trump has claimed that the US has spent hundreds of billions of dollars on arms for Ukraine. Actually the total figure is around $67 billion. But he came to the White House with the promise that the open-chequebook arrangement with the Kyiv government would stop, and with his canny bill-paying arrangement, he has kind of stuck to his guns, as it were. Anyway, Ukraine gets what it needs to carry on the fight with Russia, and Trump continues trying to end the war by cuddling up to Putin. It might work, or it might not. So far, it definitely hasn't.

Xi Zinping outsmarts Donald Trump with invite to Kim Jong-un

Is this a coincidence or a smart move by China's leader to undermine Donald Trump? Xi Zinping, it has been announced today, has invited the North Korea leader Kim Jong-un to join him and Vladimir Putin for a military parade in Beijing on September 3. It comes just 24 hours after Trump said he would be happy to meet Kim Jong-un and have another go at charming him, and mentioned a possible time later this year. Then out pops the beaming Chinese president and says: "Ha, Mr Trump, I've got my invite in before you." So the Terrible Threesome, Xi, Putin and Kim, will be all smiles together on the VIP dais to watch China's fancy weapons parading through Tiananmen Square, followed, no doubt, by lots of state noodles. It's definitely a grrrr moment for Trump who knows he has been out-cunninged by his Beijing rival. Kim Jong-un wins either way. He can be satisfied that his friend in Beijing has selected him for special honours and he will get a chance to have more chats with Vlad, his strategic partner. He also has the satisfaction to be reminded that Trump looks upon him as a friend and that they could be meeting up for another wonderful shaking of hands sometime soon. Obviously, Trump was never going to be invited to the Beijing jamboree but, still, he must be cursing Xi for taking the headlines away from him.

Is the UK so miserable as everyone is saying?

The American newspapers like to get a bee in their bonnet about the United Kingdom, especially when things are not going right. "Broken Britain" seems to be the favourite headline at the moment. Is this true and, if so, why? First of all, Britain is a beautiful country and one of the best to live in happily. But there is no doubt that currently there is a sort of malaise around which is hitting a lot of people. The Labour government appears not to have a clue about how to boost the economy and make everyone want to work and prosper. Every attempt to improve the economy has largely failed. Huge political mistakes were made early on in the Keir Starmer government and the country has yet to recover from them. Now, everyone, from the rich down to the poorest, are afraid of what Rachel Reeves, the Chancellor, is going to do to confront the $20 billion hole in the finances. What she should do is put income tax up by one per cent but she won't and can't do that because the Labour Manifesto prior to the election which they won so comfortably, promised not to raise income tax. That was stupid, politically and economically. No government should ever close options. The alternatives will be hugely unpopular and probably unsuccessful. Then there's the small-boats scandal with thousands more migrants popping over the Channel onto English beaches every week, and nothing seems to stop them. Huge sums of money have been paid to France to police the Calais beaches and prevent gang leaders from pusing off the next migrant-packed boat. Yet still they come. No one has an answer to this crisis. Hotels are full of asylum seekers, protests are rising. It's all totally out of control. The Conservatives were hopeless about resolving this issue, and now Labour is also all over the place. Nothing has been effective. So the poor economy and the small boats, and the lack of jobs for all the students who have just graduated from university with no hopes of a decent career have soured the whole population. So, for once, the US newspaper headlines are pretty right. However, this is still a great country, with fabulous people, gorgeous countryside and an awesome history. There is always room for optimism that things will turn out all right eventually. That is what miserable Britain is counting on.

Trump and Kim Jong-un, here we go again

It looks like we are in for another Donald Trump and Kim Jong-un love-in. Until now, Trump's foreign policy moves have mostly been about Russia, Ukraine, Gaza and Israel, Iran and Houthis, with a little bit of India-Pakistan, Armenia and Azerbaijan thrown in. No mention of North Korea, let alone his old friend Kim Jong-un. But at last Trump has spoken his name and reminded everyone that he has a great relationship with the fellow in Panmunjom. The North Korean leader must be chuffed to know that at some point later this year the great Donald will be skaking his hand once again. The last time they met, in Hanoi, Trump walked off in a huff because his friend didn't concede one iota vis a vis his nukes. Now, years later, North Korea has more nuclear warheads and more intercontinental ballistic missiles. It's too late. far too late, for Trump to even dream about persuading Kim Jong-un (or Kim Jong Un or Kim Jong un) to give up all his nukes and become friends with South Korea. Kim Jong-un, like Vladimir Putin, will be delighted to have a meet with the president of the United States because it builds up his status as an important person on the world stage, which he loves. Just like Putin. So, Trump will be doing him a favour by going to talk to him. But will anything come of it? Will Kim Jong-un this time be in a conciliatory mood? No, of course not. He is committed to his nukes and will never give them up.

Why Putin asked for the Alaska summit

It was Vladimir Putin who asked Donald Trump for a meeting on Ukraine, and the White House picked on Alaska, the US territory closest to Russia. Everyone, including me, thought it was at least a positive move that Putin had asked for the summit. Trump leapt on the suggestion and the rest is red-carpet history. But, on reflection, it was actually Putin's cleverest move. He knew that if he requested a summit with Trump it would be seized on as a sign of the Russian leader's desperation to persuade Trump to go for a deal which would suit Moscow in every way. But, clearly, the cunning plan was very simple: Putin wanted to be back on the world stage and he knew that if he offered to meet Trump it would be greeted as a sign of weakness on his part when in fact it was a sign of his dominating strength. He got the full works from Trump, including a ride in The Beast armoured car that transports the US president around. All the world thought, this is brilliant, the war is going to come to an end. But Putin achieved exactly what he wanted. He trapped Trump into meeting and then because it provoked world headlines, he gambled, successfully, that if the summit didn't match up to expectations (which he knew it wouldn't), Trump wouldn't and couldn't then blast him with more severe sanctions, as he had promised he would do. So, the whole summit plan was a coup by Putin. He was able to outline his demands without being punished and then went home and continued bombing Ukraine. Post-summit, Putin is in a much better, stronger position, while Trump has got very little, even though JD Vance is claiming that Putin offered concessions. The concessions were so insignificant they weren't worth studying. So, Putin is winning, winning, winning.

Sanctions have totally failed to stop the Russian war in Ukraine

It has to be said that nothing the West has done so far, whether it be economic sanctions against Moscow or arms supplies to Kyiv have succeeded in stopping Putin from continuing to bomb and destroy Ukrainian cities and power infrastructure. It's the old story. Sanctions don't work. Why? Because whoever is being sanctioned finds ways to get round the restrictions and, in particular, finds countries who are still prepared to do business with Moscow. North Korea is heavily sanctioned for developing nuclear weapons but has it stopped Kim Jong-un's nuclear programme or driven his regime to its knees? No, absolutely not. North Korean people may be suffering but the regime is fine thank you very much. The same with Putin. The sanctions have caused problems but they have failed to make a huge difference. Russia is still trading and selling oil around the world, especially to China and India, and its economy is doing well enough to continue the war in Ukraine at full pelt. Even Trump's warning of severe consequences if the war doesn't come to an end soon is falling on stony ground. Putin doesn't care. He has built a war economy and the arms prpduction companies are doing very nicely. Sanctions sound a nice and easy way of forcing a country to behave, but they seldom ever work.

Pentagon's intelligence chief is fired over Iran nukes report

The least surprising development in the Trump world today was the sacking of Lieutenant-General Jeffery Kruse. the head of the Pentagon's Defence Intelligence Agency. He must have known he would be fired from the moment his agency unwisely published a report too soon after the US B-2 bombing of Iran's nuclear plants in June. The DIA claimed that, despite President Trump insisting Iran's nuclear weapons programme had been blasted into kingdom come, only a small amount of damage had been done to the three nuclear sites and that Tehran's clandestine project would be up and running in a matter of months. It was a stupidly imprudent report for several reasons: first, it was premature, all the DIA was basing its report on was satellite images of the bombed plants, second, you don't contradict what the president is claiming in his face, especially someone like Trump, and third, the DIA was wrong. Substantial damage WAS done to the three plants. Even the Iranians agreed to that. Later intelligence assessments said the bombings had put back Iran's enriched- uranium programme by at least a year and probably two years. Ok, so the sites were not incinerated, some stuff survived. But basically it was a huge blow to Tehran's undeclared ambition to build a nuclear bomb. So the DIA had egg all over its face. Why the agency decided to rush into such a quick assessment is unclear but to do so when Trump was telling the world that Iran's nuke plants were obliterated was just totally stupid. If the DIA had been proved right, it wouldn't have saved General Kruse's job but it might have put a bit of gloss on the agency. All in all, Kruse's sacking was just a matter of time. BUY MY NEW SUPER SPY THRILLER, AGENT REDRUTH, PUBLISHED AS A PAPERBACK BY ROWANVALE BOOKS. ORDER FROM AMAZON

The war in Ukraine is going to get much worse

If all txhe peace efforts and summits fail to find a solution to ending the war in Ukraine I can see the conflict getting much worse and much more dangerous. Russia is already using every missile at its disposal, including hypersonic systems and long-range cruise missiles. But Ukraine has been developing its own missiles with longer and longer ranges and these weapons are likely to be used on a much greater scale in the future to hit targets in Russia. This is when the war will become more scary. Ukraine has now got a long-range ground-launched cruise missile it calls Flamingo. It has a reported range of 3,000 kilometres or about 1,800 miles. Right now they are building one Flamingo every day but the production rate is expected to increase significantly. With this weapon, Kyiv can hit Russian military targats deep inside Russia. Even Donald Trump agrees that hitting Russia itself is an obvious way forward if you want to win the war. Russia is going to get targeted more and more. Will this finally force Putin to seek a negotiated deal? It might help.

Putin keeps up the toll of death and destruction in Ukraine

War is such a cynical business. Diplomacy, too, in the wrong hands is also a very cynical business. Vladimir Putin, just known as Vladimir to his supposed friend Donald Trump, is the most cynical of all leaders vis a vis war and diplomacy. He claimed he was ready to meet Zelensky but then backed off as soon as he had returned to Moscow. He then picked up the phone to his military people and said, bomb, bomb, bomb. Sure enough, more than 500 drones and missiles, including hysersonic and cruise missiles, were showered on Ukrainian cities. The message was clear. Putin will never do a deal with Zelensky to stop the bombing unless the Ukrainian leader capitulates totally and hands over his country to Russian domination. Putin doesn't really care a jot about Trump. Trump thinks of Putin as his friend, but Putin is not Trump's friend. It's all show and cunning. There will be no peace deal, there certainly will not be a coalition of willing European troops guarding Ukraine against further Russian aggression. Putin would never allow it anyway. The mass bombing today just proves that all along Putin has been playing with Trump and playing with the West. Remember, his real friends are Xi Zinping, the Communist leader of China who wants total domination in his region of the world and is seen by the Pentagon as America's future adversary, Kim Jong-un, the North Korean dictator who is adding more and more warheads to his nuclear stockpile, and Ayatollah Khamenei, the tyrant of Iran who hates America and the West. These are Putin's natural bedfellows. The push for peace in Ukraine was and is a thankless and ultimately unachievable dream. So, everything in Anhorage was just a chance for Putin to demonstrate he is in charge of what will happen to Ukraine. Trump and Macron and Mertz and Starmer and Meloni et al are pushing against a concrete wall and Putin is safely on the other side, laughing.

Putin has given Trump a big dilemma over Ukraine

Donald Trump is used to getting everything his own way. That's how he does business. If he wants a deal, he gets a deal. But Vladimir Putin is screwing him over. Everything coming out of the Kremlin right now, whether it's in Putin's words or in the doleful voice of Sergei Lavrov, the Russian foreign minister, the focus is on slowing everything down. Slow, slow, no quick, no quick, slow. Lavrov says if there is to be a meeting between Putin and President Zelensky there has to be a long process, step by step, with officials doing all the groundwork and then building up to a potential formula for more meetings etc etc. Actually, this is how summits are normally planned to be fair. But we have Trump in the White House and he wants instant drama and instant decisions and instant ends of crises. Moscow, and certainly Lavrow, the old, old timer, doesn't like to do business that way. Nyet, nyet, nyet. So, all the excitement and enthusiasm generated by Trump's meeting with Putin Anchorage has now ground down to the minutiae of summit planning which means that if there is ever a session between Putin and Zelensky, it won't be for months and months. Even if both sides agree in principal there will be long arguments about where it should take place. I see Politico is claiming Trump administration sources are putting Budapest forward, and Switzerland has offered a venue, promising not to arrest Putin for war crimes. A nice touch, that. Putin says it should be Moscow, but Zelensky will never set foot in Moscow. So, that's a no, no. You see what I mean? This coud all take a long time. Meanwhile, the war and the killing and the destruction and the kidnaps of Ukrainian children will go on. Trump is going to get more and more frustrated and angry and then it will all burst into a right old mess. But Putin won't care because, basically, he just wants to carry on trying to subjugate Ukraine. All this Trump charm offensive is so much blather.

What game is Putin really playing?

The one thing that Keir Starmer has got right is that Vladimir Putin doesn't want peace. Well, not peace at any cost. If there is going to be peace in Ukraine, whatever that means, it will be on Putin's terms. Donald Trump is convinced that Putin does want a peace deal and was caught saying so on a hot mic when talking to Emmanuel Macron at the White House gathering yesterday. But Starmer is right, Putin is not interested in a deal. Not yet. He wants to make sure that if and when there is an end to the war, he has everything or most of it, tucked up neatly in a bag, so that Zelensky has nothing left to negotiate with. So, despite all the supposedly promising signs that Trump is putting out, especially his announcement that Putin has agreed to a meeting with Zelensky - maybe in two weeks - the Russian president hasn't changed his position one iota. His message is still the same as it has been ever since the invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. I have respect for Senator Lindsey Graham, the Republican with a nose for foreign affairs, who claims, rightly in my view, that the only reason Putin asked for the summit with Trump in Alaska was to forestall the US from imposing a massive 500 per cent tarrif on India and others who still buy Russian oil. The 50 per cent tariff already imposed on India persuaded Putin that he needed to do something fast to stop the tariff rising to 500 per cent, a level which is in a bill laid before Congress by Lindsey Graham. It's the old adage, leaders like Putin only come running when put under huge pressure. Putin is scared that if India and maybe China, the two biggest importers of Russian oil, have 500 per cent tariffs put on them, the Russian economy will go down the drain very rapidly. So, very cleverly, he told Trump he was ready to meet for a summit, and it worked. Trump played the summit like a baby, grinning and smiling at everything Putin said and did. Putin got what he wanted. There wasn't even a hint of a 500 per cent tariff on Russia's oil importers. In fact Trump proved to be as good as gold. No "severe consequences" for failing to agree a ceasefire, and suddenly, no talk of ceasefire anymore. Round One definitely went to Putin. Lindsey Graham is right, smash the Russian economy with massive sanctions, then and only then will Putin beg for mercy and do a deal.

European leaders' last throw

On the face of it, today's meeting at the White House is Donald Trump versus Zelensky and all the major European leaders. It's not going to be a love-in, and it's not going to be an alliance-led judgment call to end the war in Ukraine. This war is now all about Trump and Putin. I'm not sure anyone else will really get a look in. Marco Rubio, US secretary of state and national security adviser and half a dozen other jobs, says Europe has been consulted from the beginning, so today's meeting is not a confrontation with Europe. But that's precisely what it is because Trump has made it clear he agrees with Putin that the only way to stop the death and destruction - which continues by the way - is for Zelensky to hand over the two regions in Donbas that the Russian leader has his eye on - Donetsk and Luhansk. There are parts of these two key regions which Ukraine still holds and regards as vital defensive positions to stop further advances by Russian troops. If they are forced to hand over both regions, that will provide Putin with a terrific strategic advantage, giving him the chance in the future to launch further attacks. But Trump seems to want Zelensky to aceept and will expect all the European leaders to follow like lambs. But they can't and nor can Zelensky because that's what these last three and a half years have been all about - fighting the Russians and driving them back over the border, not allowing them to keep the land they have seized, around 20 per cent of Ukraine. This is not going to happen but Zelensky and Europe are stuck because of their adamant refusal to cmnsider land-swaps. Impasse, I think.

Trump has accepted the Ukraine war reality

All the commentators on the so-called summit between Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin have come to the conclusion - including me - that the Russian leader got what he wanted and the US president left with nothing except rising concern ringing in the ears of Kyiv and the whole of Europe. But let's look at it another way. Trump is, I assume, a realist and during the summit he must have realised that the Big Deal in which everyone would be happy is just not on the cards. As Trump warned Zelensky at that infamous Oval Office spat, Ukraine has no cards to play. Trump has realised that whatever he does as the US president - ie more sanctions against Russia, more weapons for Ukraine - it's probably not going to make a difference because Putin will carry on the war however much economic suffering he has to endure. After all, he doesn't seem to care that a million Russian troops have now been killed or wounded in the war, so why worry too much about sanctions. He has always got China, North Korea, Iran and India to rely on to keep trading with him. This is the reality that I think hit Trump between the eyes in the summit. The session with Putin lasted three and a half hours but actually you can cut that in half because of the reqwuirement to translate everything as they went along. Putin didn't budge from his red lines. He has never budged from his red lines. While Trump has prevaricated over his stance on Ukraine so many times that no one knows from day to day what he will come with next. But the summit reminded Trump that actually Putin has all the cards and he is not going to end the war unless he gets all the land he wants which is pretty much the whole of the Donbas region in eastern Ukraine. And, most importantly, Putin is not remotely interested in a ceasefire. What will he gain by a ceasefire? Nothing. So that's why Trump didn't mention the need for a ceasefire, he just focused on the reality which is that the war will not come to an end without Zelensky caving in and agreeing to hand over the land Putin wants. This is the message, loud and clear, which Zelensky is going to get when he meets Trump in the White House tomorrow and it's the message which every European leader is going to get. Accept reality or see the war going on for ever. That's the message Trump must have got from the summit at the US military base outside Anchorage. This presents a huge crisis for Europe. Do they go along with the Trump assessment or continue supporting Ukraine with weapons and diplomatic back-up? If they do the latter, Putin's smile will just get bigger and bigger. BUY MY NEW SPY THRILLER, AGENT REDRUTH, A RIVETING READ ACCORDING TO ALL THOSE WHO HAVE BOUGHT IT. GET IT FROM AMAZON, ROWANVALE BOOKS, WATERSTONES, ETC.

Trump got nothing, Putin got everything

There is no other way of summing up the "historic" summit between Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin on American soil. Putin arrived with a smile on his face and left with a broad grin. He spoke to Trump and his small team for three and a half hours at the meeting in Anchorage, Alaska, and offered absolutely zilch in terms of a ceasefire in Ukraine, let alone,a path towards a peaceful settlement. Well, of course, there is no such thing as a peaceful settlement in Ukraine, just a deal to stop the killing. That's not the same thing. Putin spouted for far too long about relations between the US and Russia and how much he enjoyed Trump's company but the word "ceaefire" never left his lips at the bizarre no-questions press conference and because Trumpo allowed him to speak first, the US president had to stand there like a shop-window mannekin while his Moscow counterpart rambled on and on, speaking from a prepared statement which could have been written a long time ago. Everything went Putin's way. Trump didn't say he was disappointed about failing to get any sort of deal and he didn't say, as he had promised, that as the summit had failed he would impose caatstrophic sanctions on Russia. He said none of that. All Trump did was to say there had been progress, that he liked Vladimir very much and they got on well. Putin beamed. When he returned to Moscow the same night, he must have been greeted as a returning hero. And by the way, the drones and ballistic missiles kept on being launched at Ukraine. So, no change there. It was, in a nutshell, a red-carpet, charm offensive but all done with mirrors. Nothing was achieved. Zero out of zero. Zelensky has no chance of getting any sort of deal that will benefit Ukraine and the Ukrainian people. BUY MY NEW SPY THRILLER, AGENT REDRUTH, OUT NOW - AMAZON, ROWANVALE BOOKS, WATERSTONES.

Two men with their nuclear codes sitting opposite each other

It's alays a bizarre thought that when the presidents of the United States and Russia get together they always have the briefcase with nuclear warfare codes inside just a few feet away. Armageddon is always a finger-pressure button nearby. It's why Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin will know that when they sit down for their session on the Ukraine war this evening at a US military base near Anchorage in Alaska, they are without much argument the two most powerful people on earth. That fact alone makes it less likely that there will be a deal to end the war at the summit because neither leader will want to be seen to be defeated by the other and neither will want the other to claim victory. What normally happens in these cases is that both leaders claim victory and then spend the next few weeks trying to prove that they came out better. If Putin feels Trump is not going his way, all he needs do is nod to his military people and they will order massive bombing of Kyiv and other cities in Ukraine. If Trump feels Putin is not budging, he will tell his Treasury people to start building a new massive sanctions package to damage Russia's war economy. In reality, there will be no real drama. Both sides will have a long chat and then let their officials have a further session in a different room and they will produce a document of sorts which points the way forward for another meeting. And so it will go on. BUY MY NEW SPY THRILLER, AGENT REDRUTH, SEQUEL TO SHADOW LIVES. OUT NOW WITH AMAZON, ROWANVALE BOOKS AND WATERSTONES.

How might the Trump-Putin summit go?

The Trump-Putin summit in Alaska could be the flop of the century or turn out to be the first step towards negotiating a ceasefire in Ukraine and an end to the war. The White House has been trying to downgrade expectations of any breakthrough and has described the meeting on Friday as an opportunity for President Trump to listen to President Putin’s pitch and assess whether the Russian leader actually wants peace or not. Trump says he will be able to do this within two minutes. While it might be sensible to lower expectations, always a favourite ploy of political leaders, the Anchorage summit might just be different. First of all, Putin asked for it, and secondly, he has hanging over his head Trump’s threats to ratchet up economic sanctions. If Putin plans to pursue his war in Ukraine and, possibly, have other military adventures in the future, he can ill afford Russia’s economy to worsen. The key to the summit will be whether Putin shows even a hint of compromise. If Putin starts the session with a drawn-out monologue about how the war can never come to an end without the ‘root causes’ being accepted and respected by Trump – principally Nato’s open-door policy which allowed Ukraine to be considered as a future member of the alliance – then the talks may never get off the ground. However, Putin has learned much from his relatively long association with Trump. He knows Trump is sceptical of Ukraine ever joining Nato, and he will be hopeful that he can get that in writing, something which America’s western alliance partners will be desperate to prevent. The alternative, at this stage no doubt unacceptable in Moscow, would be a cleverly-framed security guarantee agreement in which Ukraine would have US and European military backing to deter Moscow from launching any future invasion of Ukraine. It would be a sort of Nato-lite arrangement. If that were to happen, then Kyiv might be persuaded to give up some of the Russian-occupied territory in eastern and southern Ukraine (as well as Crimea). At the moment, President Zelensky and nearly all European leaders are adamantly opposed to any land-swap. The wily Senator Lindsey Graham, a Trump supporter and a veteran international security affairs protagonist, said in an NBC News interview at the weekend that land exchanges would only happen ‘after you have security guarantees to Ukraine to prevent Russia from doing this again. ‘You need to tell Putin what happens if he does it a third time,’ Graham said, referencing Russia’s annexing of Crimea in 2014 and the invasion of Ukraine on 24 February, 2022. One bizarre option for the occupied territories supposedly discussed by Steve Witkoff, Trump's special envoy, is to convert them into Moscow-governed regions without Kyiv having to concede sovereignty. According to a report in the Times, it would be a formula similar in style and structure to the Palestinian territory of the West Bank, which is occupied by Israeli troops. The idea would be to get round Ukraine's constitution which disallows any ceding of territory unless approved by a national referendum. The White House gave the idea short shrift. So who will have the upper hand at the Friday summit to be held at Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson, 11 miles north-east of Anchorage and 4,500 miles from Moscow? Despite being a self-professed dealmaker, Trump will be at a disadvantage. He has already indicated that any peace deal is bound to involve Moscow holding on to some of the territory it is currently occupying. Crimea is a given in his mind and key parts of Donbas, consisting of the eastern regions of Luhansk and Donetsk, are also likely to be prominent in his land-swap blueprint. But he has President Zelensky and European allies ranged against him. Zelensky refuses to consider any handover of territory occupied by Russian invaders and he, and Europe, say concessions of this nature would be an invitation to Putin to plot further aggression in the future. This argument will have been underlined during the video conference yesterday between Trump, Zelensky and key European leaders, including Keir Starmer. Trump knows all the arguments. He has heard them over and over again. But he seems to feel that Putin is ready for a deal of some sort, and he wants to exploit that to find a way of avoiding all the fears emanating from Kyiv and European capitals. Trump does have cards of his own. If Putin declines a ceasefire, Trump has serious sanctions at- the-ready, including penalising all countries still buying cheap Russian oil. He can also tell Putin that if he rejects all attempts to stop the bombing of Ukrainian cities, the US will start delivering to Kyiv on a large scale the sort of long-range weapons which can put military targets inside Russia at much greater risk. Putin doesn’t have everything going his way. The battlefield landscape has changed in his favour, but not dramatically so. For example, Russian troops are trying to encircle and overcome Pokrovsk, a strategic city northwest of Donetsk which is vital for Ukrainian military resupply logistics. Although Russian forces have made tactical advances, they have failed to follow through with any significant success. This has been the story of the war in eastern Ukraine. Putin would have wanted a victory on the battlefield in this region to provide him with leverage at the Alaska summit. But Ukrainian temerity and the exploitation of advanced drone warfare have stymied the Russians. For the summit in Alaska to be deemed successful, much will obviously depend on the personal relationship between Trump and Putin. Trump seemed genuinely angry after he spoke on the phone to the Russian leader in early July only for Russia to launch 550 drones and missiles in one of the largest attacks on Ukraine. This is why Zelensky has emphasised repeatedly that Putin must agree to a ceasefire before any serious peace negotiations can begin. After Putin’s previous blatant rejection of Trump’s phone-call peace efforts, the US President will surely demand new ground rules when they sit down together at the military base near Anchorage. Ceasefire first, and then a framework for peace, with Zelensky invited as a co-participant. BUY MY NEW SPY THRILLER, AGENT REDRUTH, SEQUEL TO SHADOW LIVES, BOTH STARRING SUPER UNOFFICIAL SPY REBECCA STRONG. ORDER/BUY FROM AMAZON, ROWANVALE BOOKS AND WATERSTONES.

Putin's swagger walk bodes ill for the summit

The two men walk differently. Vladimir Putin is short in stature and walks as if he has a bouncy castle in his shoes. He also walks slightly lopsided with more emphasis with his left arm than his right, as if he is preparing to launch off somewhere. He walks with a very firm progress, often down long carpeted corridors in the Kremlin until he meets for a shake hands with his latest visitor. He doesn't smile but he looks pleased. Donald Trump, on the other hand, is a big bloke and walks like a big bloke, with arms down by his side, head slightly bent forward. It's a slumbrous walk, not fast, but sort of slow and business-like. He wears a looser fitting suit than Putin. Putin always, on first entry onto the public stage, does up his middle jacket button. Trump sometimes does but also quite likes to have the suit jacket hanging loose. Trump enjoys his height and bigness. Putin makes up for his lack of height by being positively jaunty. All of these characteristics will be observed and monitored and analysed during the one-day summit in Alaska. When they meet for the cameras, Trump will win because he will tower over Putin but once they are sitting down, that advantage will vanish. Both Trump and Putin will lean forward when they are sitting at the negotiating table. Height won't matter. Putin has one big advantage. He has been president for much longer than Trump and is very comfortable in his skin. Trump will be worrying all the time about his hair. Putin doesn't have to worry about that.

Why is the White House lowering expectations for the Putin summit?

There is no point in having low expections for this upcoming Trump-Putin extravaganza. Why bother make the journey if all we are going to get is a Putin victory parade or a Putin nothing-doing show or a smiley-smiley handshakey get-together where the weather in Alaska takes up most of the conversation. The White House is dampening down any expectation of any sort of deal. But I think this is all part of the deliberate policy to warn us ordinary folk that this summit is just a way of meeting face-to-face with Putin but nothing else. This is probably nonsense. In the real world, you don't even have a summit unless the whole procedure has been orchestrated by officials. Behind the scenes, before the announcement of the Alaska meeting, an agreement will have been reached between Trump's people and Putin's people for a breakthrough of some sort. Otherwise, as I say, it's all pointless. So, Putin is going to come up with a compromise. It may be a tiny one but it will give Trump what he needs - progress or perceived progress towards an end to the war. Trump will also come up with a Big Idea, also already discussed between Steve Witkoff, Trump's special envoy, and Putin, when they met in Moscow last week. Trump has said he will walk out if Putin says nothing to give hope of an end to the war. But Trump won't walk out because everything has been agreed. This is the way business has always been done when it comes to summits. Well, not always. Trump did walk out from his summit with Kim Jong-un in his first term in the White House. But that's because the North Korean leader had not played by the rules. What was agreed beforehand didn't materialise. More fool Kim Jong-un. Putin, I suspect, is far too wily to give Trump nothing.

Trump and Israeli settlers share one thing in common

Washington DC may be 15 hours flying time from Ramallah in the West Bank but the two places are currently engaged in the same kind of people-movement strategy. Donald Trump has sudenly become worried about crime in Washington DC, even though the violent crime rates are significantly down, and he has ordered all homeless people living on the streets in the capital to move out and find somewhere else to live. Likewise, Israeli settlers, not the most gentle of souls, are stepping up their efforts to expand their territorial presence in the West Bank which entails driving Palestinian people from their homes. It's an ugly business and coincides with the Israeli government's intention to force all 800,000 Palestinians out of Gaza City while the military seeks out the last live and dead hostages, and root out the remaining Hamas gunmen - still believed to be in their thousands. In the Bosnia war in the 1990s, it used to be called ethnic cleansing. But in Israel, it's described as the right strategy to eliminate Hamas and keep the Israeli borders safe. In Washington, the plan to force out all homeless people who live in tents dotted around the capital, is all about prettyfying and safeguarding the US capital. The last time I went to Washington it all looked pretty clean and safe. The thousands of tents on every blade of grass in the capital had gone. But Trump is of the view that the mayor of Washington has failed to keep the capital city safe and he wants to send National Guard soldiers and FBI agents to patrol the streets. That's on top of the myriad of police forces which already patrol the city, and the Secret Service which mounts 24-hour armed protection around and in the vicinity of the White House. Getting rid of undesirable people is now the Big Thing. Personally, I feel sorry for the homeless in Washington and the Palestinians being forced out of their homes in the West Bank.

Can there be peace in Ukraine without Zelensky?

There is something morally wrong and disasteful about two nuclear superpowers rearranging the landscape of a country which haw been brutally invaded and is now fighting for its future. Arbitrarily drawing lines on the map to sort out border and territorial issues has historically been a disaster, and all the signs are that between them, Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin are going to redraw the borders of Ukraine to suit Moscow and not Kyiv. This is why poor old Zelensky whose army of brave souls has been fighting the Russians for more than three years will have to play a part in the Big Summit if Kyiv is going to get a word in edgeways to bring the terrible war to an end. Whatever ideas Trump and Putin talk about at their summit in Alaska on Friday, none of it will be good news for Zelensky because the reality of the situation is that Russian troops occupy large parts of eastern Ukraine as well as Crimea and they are not going to hand any of it over to Kyiv. That's the basic fact of life. But the only person who can really argue his case against such a deal is Zelensky, and if he's not there in Alaska, the Ukrainian voice will be drowned out. Unless Trump has a plan to force Putin to give Zelensky something, and I'm not talking about half a town here or a third of a village there. It will have to be something truly substantial, something he can sell to his battered country to make all the sacrifices even a tiny bit worthwhile. Without Zelensky in person - not a Zoom call - in Alaska, there is a far greater chance that the Ukrainian leader will be presented with a fait accompli. Or nothing at all. Peace may turn out to be the one word that doesn't get mentioned. A possible deal, yes. But, peace? No.

Impasse over land-grab in Ukraine

A long time ago a very sensible chairman of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff, General Mark Milley, said that the war in Ukraine would come to an end only through a diplomatic deal and that such a deal would inevitably require compromise on both sides. Are we now at a pivotal point where a deal is at least theoretically on the cards? Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin are to meet in Alaska on Friday to go through the possible deals and all of them will include some form of land-swap, or land-grab, to put it more honestly. Sources from within the Trump admnistration have said that Trump will be ready to accept the reality that to get a brokered aggrement, Putin will have to be allowed to hang on to some of the territory his troops have seized both before and after the February 24 2022 invasion. In other words, the whole of Crimea, annexed illegally in 2014, and much of the eastern Donbas region of Ukraine, some of it grabbed before 2022 and most of it since the invasion. This has been in Trump's thinking ever since he promised to end the war within 24 hours of taking office for his second term in the White House. But President Zelensky who has not been invited to the Alaska summit, has now said, as he has always said, that no peace can ever be achieved if the aggressors - ie Moscow - are gifted chunks of Ukrainian land. Europe has always said the same thing, so there won't be any European leaders who will agree to what Trump appears to have in mind. The Alaska summit will, therefore, be a total waste of time. Or will it? Zelensky has understandably taken his position on land because it is his country which is the victim of Moscow's aggression and he cannot voluntarily agree to hand Russia the land which his army has fought over so hard and with such sacrifice. But the reality is that if he wants "peace" he will need to compromise. There will be no deal without compromise. What Zelensky needs to focus on is what he can get in exchange from Moscow if he concedes some territory. Russia MUST be seen to have compromised as well. Even if it's not on land it will have to be something else that is important to Ukraine, such as its survival as an independent country and protected by some form of Western-backed structure.

Fifty million dollar bounty on Nicolas Maduro's head

How Nicolas Maduro has survived for so long as president of Venezuela is hard to fathom when the United States thinks he is a major drug trafficker and nearly every impoverished citizen of that desperate country hates him. He is a monster of a leader and should have been behind bars a long time ago. He has destroyed his country and put fear into its population, driving hundreds of thousands of people to leave the country and find succour almost anywhere else in central and south America. Now Pam Bondi, the US attorney general, has upped the bounty for his arrest from $25 million to $50 million. Surely that will provide enough incentive for someone to plot his arrest. But, as with all dictators, Maduro is protected by a well-paid army and police force whose livelihoods are dependent on staying loyal to him. Previous coup attempts, whether engineered from overseas or from within Venezuela, have all failed. Donald Trump has probably had thoughts about sending in the Marines to grab him but so far has kept such a plan on the shelf. So the $50 million bounty is seen as the next best thing to root this dictator out of his luxury palace and see him taken away in handcuffs. The whole of Venezuela, except the military and police, would applaud.

Trump and Putin to meet in UAE?

So it's going to happen at last, a meeting between Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin. It's obvious why Trump wants the meeting but why has Putin agreed finally? What does he have up his sleeve? Will his message remain the same as ever re the war in Ukraine. Sorry, HIS war in Ukraine. He might possibly agree to give up the objective of conquering/destroying Ukraine but he will never give up his main red lines: that Ukraine can never ever ever join Nato, and preferably not the European Union either, and that the army must demilitarise, and, probably above all, that Volodymyr Zelensky must step down as president. Trump can probably give Putin something on the Nato question because he has hinted at it in the past. He doesn't envisage Ukraine becoming part of the alliance. But he can't force Zelensky to resign and he will surely argue that a country the size of Ukraine has the right and necessity to maintain armed forces to protect its sovereignty against aggressors. ie against any future Russian invasion. If Putin is not prepared to concede on these key issues then I can't see the summit between Trump and Putin getting anywhere. So why has Putin agreed? Because, despite everything, he wants to keep in with Trump. Never in more than 20 years of being Russian leader has Putin had a man in the White House he could actually do business with, and he wants to keep the relationship going somehow. So he will arrive for the summit seemingly ready to talk about a peace deal but I reckon we are still a long way from a Putin signature. As for the proposed meeting betwen Trump, Putin and Zelensky, it won't happen if the UAE summit goes badly and either Trump or Putin walks out.

Trump "probably" won't go for 2028 election

The word "probably" has so much depth to it. It's probably no but not necessarily no, it could be probably no but depending on the political and constitutional situation at the time, or it could probably be no unless the nation appeals to him to stay on for another four years. It's the last one which will attract Trump's ego. If he has had a relatively successful second term, he might think every American will want him for another four years by which time incidentally he would be approaching his late-80s. However, on balance, he appears to be coming round to the view that he won't stand again, either because the constitution says he can't or because he is happy with his potential successor, provide of course it's a Republican. So, when asked outright whom he wants to succeed him he puts JD Vance first, because as vice president that is his right. But in his latest comments, he couldn't resist praising Marco Rubio who is still combining three jobs. secretary of state, national security adviser and head of international aid. Trump seemed to be suggesting that Marco Rubio could be Vance's running-mate. Vance might have other ideas. It all shows that Trump is already thinking ahead. He wants a Trump III in the White House in three and a half years, and clearly thinks Vance and/or Rubio will just carry on the MAGA momentum. If that is what happens, then the Trump brand could be here (well, in the US) for another eleven and a half years. BUY MY NEW SPY THRILLER, AGENT REDRUTH, PUBLISHED BY ROWANVALE BOOKS. BUY FROM AMAZON.

Has Trump now given up on Putin?

Ultimatums, deadlines, warnings, threats, none of them have changed Vladimir Putin's strategic objective which is to turn Ukraine into a vassal state. It doesn't seem to matter what Trump says, he is ignored by Putin. So, have we reached a point where Trump has officially given up on Putin and will push ahead with huge new sanctions to punish Russia and cripple its economy? He has been threatening to do it for weeks but he told the BBC in an interview recently that he hadn't yet given up on Putin. That may well have changed since the interview with the excellent Gary O'Donoghue in Washington. There is really very little point in giving Pytin one last chance. He will ignore that, too. He is just steaming ahead with trying to conquer Ukraine, in the hope that his former friend, Trump, will not go ahead with the new round of sanctions. But Trump has no other option. The bombs and missiles keep coming and hitting Ukrainian cities and destroying the infrastructure. Threats make no difference. Action might. If Trump imposes 100 per cent or 500 per cent tariffs on all countries who buy cheap Russian oil, it could very quickly undermine Putin's war machine. He needs the oil money to feed and arm his soldiers in Ukraine and produce more artillery shells, rockets and missiles. So, no more deadlines, Mr President, just go ahead and do it. Slam the biggest-ever tariffs on Russian oil and goods and, for heaven's sake, do something about the billions which the Russian elite have secreted away in overseas bank accounts. Freeze the lot and see if that takes the smile off their faces. BUY MY NEW SPY THRILLER, AGENT REDRUTH, FROM AMAZON, ROWANVALE BOOKS, WATERSTONES ETC.

Netanyahu's all or nothing strategy

It's supposed to be a new strategy, with the Israeli prime minister now wanting all remaining hostages in Gaza released in one final batch and the demilitarisation of Hamas. Only then will the war be able to come to an end. Actually its pretty much what Netanyahu wanted from the beginning, although on day one of the war in Gaza after the Hamas atrocities of October 7 2023, he also said he wanted to kill every member of Hamas. Nobody know for sure how many Hamas fighters there are left alive after the onslaught by the Israel Defence Forces, but with all the extra recruits they got from the Palestinian prisoner releases, the designated terrorist organisation probably has between 12,000 and 15,000 members left. That's a lot of killing still to be done and as the IDF has failed to eliminate the whole organisation so far, it seems highly unlikely they can literally wipe Hamas off the map. But it looks like the IDF is under orders to do just that, so that means the war will carry on regardless. But will this persuade Hamas to hand over all the remaining hostages, only about 20 of whom are thought to be still alive. Again, it seems unlikely. Likewise, Hamas has already ruled out demilitarising. So the new all or nothing plan is really an acknowledgment that Israel will just carry on prosecuting the war until all the hostages are released and Hamas is destroyed. The only change is that it seems Netanyahu intends to use the military option to free the rest of the hostages. That means a massive ground operation with the likelihood of more civilian deaths. Nothing has really changed. The rhetoric is slightly different but Netanyahu still wants all-out revenge for October 7. While that sentiment is understandable, we all know by now that what that will mean for the non-Hamas Palestinians is a continuation of the nightmare they have faced for nearly two years. BUY AGENT REDRUTH, MY NEW SPY THRILLER PUBLISHED BY ROWANVALE BOOKS. Check out Amazon and Waterstones.

Trump and his two nuke submarines

Donald Trump sending two nuclear submarines to an appropriate region has got everyone very excited. In reality, it's a decision of no military or deterrence value. If the two boats are "boomers" - nuclear-powered ballistic-missile (nuclear) submarines which is presumably what Trump was hinting at - they can launch their Trident II D5 missiles from a range of about 7,000 miles. So, they could hit a target in Russia from any oceon, and even from an Ohio class boat moored in its home port in King's Bay, Georgia or at Banggor in Washington state. The one person who knows this Vladimir Putin. So he knows that the Trump announcement, delivered by social media, was a political statement, not a warning of potential military confrontation. Trump got the headlines he wanted, and Putin kept quiet. Whether it was a statement that was necessary or wise is difficult to say but the fact is, it reminded Russia and the rest of the world that the US is not pepared to put with the ridiculous, inflammatory, irresponsible comments from the former Russian president, Dmitry Medvedev, now a flunkey official on the Security Council of the Russian Federation. Medvedev has become a laughing stock for his outrageous, bellicose comments. But this time Trump thought he had gone too far when he warned of nuclear war between the US and Russia. Perhaps Putin will now order him to quieten down or shut up. BUY MY NEW PAPERBACK SPY THRILLER, AGENT REDRUTH, FROM AMAZON

Donald Trump wields the big stick, again

Donald Trump is in a truly bullish mood. He has launched a new tariff war by upping the rates to the countries which have failed to negotiate a trade deal by the deadline of August 1. Just watch them all scampering to broker a last-second deal. Trump has been generous and offered August 7 as the date when the new tariffs will be enforced, giving, I guess, a little leeway for those nations such as Canada which have tried to stand firm against a deal with Trump. Canada will probably come begging. But Canada hasn't helped its cause by announcing that it will recognise Palestine as a state. Trump will hold that against the Canadian leader Mark Carney. Keir Starmer must be feeling relieved that he signed his UK trade deal with Trump before he, too, announced that he would recognise Palestine unless Israel announced a ceasefire in Gaza by September. This man in the White House really has grasped the world by the most sensitive parts and squeezed. I can't think of anyone else on the planet currently capable of doing that. Is this a good thing for the US and for the West in general or is it a sign that democracy is now being shaken to the roots? Answers on a postcard! NB Buy my new paperback spy thriller, AGENT REDRUTH, from Amazon or all good bookshops.