00:00Yeah, it's tough, isn't it? Because you've got all these players on the US side, and you've mentioned them there, Rubio, Wyckoff, Driscoll, Kushner, until recently Kellogg, many voices, some of them quite inexperienced when it comes to international statesmanship.
00:18And on the other side of the table, you've got this one consistent, seasoned voice and set of opinions. I mean, you've got Kirill Dmitriev slash Vladimir Putin, I mean, absolutely in lockstep.
00:32And I'm wondering whether the Europeans find it slightly worrying that, you know, there are mixed messages on the Allied side, so on the European and US side, and very clear messages on the other side, and a mismatch, it would appear, in skill sets.
00:48Well, I would say that the messages coming out of Moscow are not 100% clear. Putin speaks, and then Dmitriev meets with Wyckoff, and there seems to be a dynamism which is not reflected by Putin himself.
01:07This may be a plan of the Russian side, but it forces everyone to calculate all the time.
01:17Now, on the American side, yes, this relative cacophony might actually be useful, because once again, the impression I get from, you know, the presidential palace here in France is that things were stuck, and Trump unstuck them.
01:39But now we have to rein in the animal, so to speak, the animal of negotiations, so that it doesn't go everywhere, but it is free to move.
01:51And they're very happy about this. Plus, they're counting the square inches on the ground.
01:58So long as the Ukrainian army does not cede too much ground in the Donbass, there is a better bargaining position.
02:09And, of course, the Russian side is just showering Ukraine with bombs in all directions, very heavily on Kiev and Dnipro, hitting so many civilians, that this is hardening the European side, and even slightly hardening, or, if you like, exasperating, the American side, who would like things to go faster.
02:34Now, to go faster, do you push Zelensky into conceding more, or do you up the ante with Putin?
02:44This is the game which the Europeans wish they understood, and which Trump is playing, and Trump being very spontaneous while he's being very calculating on the long term.
02:56He knows he wants this war to end, and money to be made on all sides, starting with the American side.
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