00:00This is Apropos.
00:04U.S. and Russian envoys meeting in Davos say they've been holding constructive talks
00:09on a possible future peace deal to end the war in Ukraine.
00:13It comes as Donald Trump's drive to acquire Greenland widens splits here in Europe.
00:18The row is being watched with glee in Moscow,
00:21even though the U.S. president's plans could have serious security ramifications for Moscow,
00:26which covets its own presence in the Arctic.
00:28Yinka Oytare takes a closer look at how relations between Russia and the United States are evolving under Trump.
00:38It's a moment that came to define their relationship.
00:42After a private two-hour meeting with only their interpreters present,
00:46Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin stepped out side by side at their 2018 Helsinki summit.
00:52What followed stunned Washington.
00:54The U.S. president broke with his own intelligence agencies,
00:57taking Putin at his word when he denied interfering in the 2016 election that brought Trump to power.
01:03I have great confidence in my intelligence people,
01:07but I will tell you that President Putin was extremely strong and powerful in his denial today.
01:15And what he did is an incredible offer.
01:17At the time, both the CIA and FBI had concluded Russia did interfere.
01:22The moment perhaps emblematic of Trump's unusually favorable view of the Russian leader,
01:28a leniency that at times has shown itself as outright praise.
01:31Trump's once said of Putin while Barack Obama was still in office,
01:35the Russian president gets an A for leadership.
01:37Putin has returned the compliments,
01:40describing his now U.S. counterpart as a very flamboyant and talented man
01:45during Trump's first presidential campaign.
01:49Let me tell you, Putin went through a hell of a lot with me.
01:52Trump's account of their relationship,
01:54raised again during a clash with the Ukrainian president Vladimir Zelensky,
01:57only reinforced perceptions of the pair's mysterious closeness.
02:01Trump has long expressed his fondness for strongmen,
02:05and that's exactly what he sees in Vladimir Putin.
02:08But those same strongman instincts have strained their relationship during Trump's second term.
02:13In April of 2025, Trump took to social media,
02:17publicly venting his frustration at Putin for continuing Russia's three-year war in Ukraine,
02:22urging him to stop as Trump attempted to broker a peace deal.
02:26Putin has since praised Trump's efforts.
02:28President Trump is making serious efforts to end this conflict.
02:33As I have said many times, he is, in my opinion, absolutely sincere.
02:39Since returning to office in January,
02:41Trump has spoken with Putin more than six times,
02:45likely more than any other world leader.
02:47A closeness some believe predates Trump's presidency.
02:50With long-standing speculation Trump has denied,
02:53the KGB once sought to recruit him during a 1987 visit to the Soviet Union.
02:59Others suggest Putin holds undisclosed leverage over the U.S. president.
03:03Whatever the truth,
03:04Trump has pursued a clear rapprochement with Putin since reclaiming the White House,
03:09at a time when Russia remains largely sidelined by the international community.
03:13Well, for more on how Washington has managed relations with Moscow during this first year of Donald Trump's second term,
03:21we're joined by Thomas Graham, a distinguished fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations.
03:27Thanks so much, Thomas, for being with us on the program.
03:30You have a lot of experience in this area.
03:32You've taught courses on U.S.-Russian relations and Russian foreign policy.
03:37You're also senior director for Russia on the National Security Council staff.
03:42What do you make of Donald Trump's approach to and relationship with the Kremlin?
03:47Well, certainly it is a strange relationship.
03:52He does have a certain affinity for Putin that goes back many, many decades.
03:58But he's found it very difficult to translate it into hard policy that actually advances American interests.
04:04You know that President Trump came to office in January of last year hoping to build a closer relationship with Russia
04:13and hoping to end the Russia-Ukraine war in 24 hours, as he said, during the campaign.
04:20He thought that he would be able to do that because he had, as he said,
04:24a very close personal relationship with President Putin.
04:28Here we are a year later, and certainly the Russia-Ukraine conflict hasn't been ended.
04:35The desire to normalize relations with Russia has actually proceeded very, very slowly,
04:41in part because the continuing conflict in and around Ukraine is a serious impediment to normalization of relations.
04:49It puts severe limits on what President Trump can do because of domestic political considerations.
04:55And so what we see is a very mixed picture over the past year.
05:00An effort at route pressure moment that hasn't gone very far.
05:04An effort to end the conflict that hasn't reached fruition yet.
05:09All that said, President Trump, through his actions, through his words,
05:14has opened up perhaps the most serious set of negotiations over a possible settlement of the Ukraine crisis
05:20over the past couple of months.
05:22But on one hand, Trump claims to, for example, fear the threat that Russia poses to U.S. security
05:28when it comes to Greenland.
05:30On the other hand, he's repeatedly taken Vladimir Putin's side when it comes to the situation in Ukraine.
05:36He's now invited him to join his so-called Board of Peace for Gaza.
05:40How do you square all of this?
05:42There seems to be a real lack of consistency in his approach,
05:46not just to Russia, but when he is on the international stage.
05:50Well, certainly, look, nobody has accused President Trump of consistency.
05:55What we all say is he is unpredictable.
05:58And he waxes hot and cold on President Putin.
06:02He still wants to build a close relationship with Russia.
06:06He thinks that is good for security reasons.
06:10He thinks that's good for commercial reasons.
06:12And so he's always been hesitant to go too far out of fear that he might alienate Putin.
06:19Strangely enough, we see the same thing on President Putin's side.
06:23He knows that Trump is unpredictable.
06:26And at times when you expect him to push back very hard against the United States,
06:32say with the bombing of Iran in the summer of last year,
06:36or the recent events surrounding Venezuela, Putin has remained silent,
06:41in part because he's concerned that if he pushes back too hard, he would alienate Putin.
06:46So you've got a strange relationship between the two.
06:49They want to normalize relationships.
06:51They know that each side is taking steps that run contrary to their interests.
06:56But they never push as hard as they would in other circumstances,
06:59because they still hold out hope for this rapprochement.
07:03And what would actually normalizing relations with Russia actually entail?
07:07What would it look like?
07:08What kind of significance would that have for Europe?
07:13This is an interesting question, in part because while the presidents have talked about normalization,
07:20they never laid out in detail what exactly that would mean.
07:24I think it's clear that at the top of the list of President Trump lies what we might call strategic commercial relations,
07:34deals in the energy sector, perhaps something in space.
07:38President Trump is always interested in fostering good commercial relations.
07:44It would also mean what President Trump has called strategic stability,
07:48some agreement on how we're going to manage our strategic arsenals,
07:52our nuclear weapons going forward.
07:55But I think many other people would see normalization of relations
07:59as including an equitable settlement of the Ukraine conflict,
08:05a restructuring of European security that protects Ukrainian interests,
08:11European interests, provides sufficient deterrence against possible Russian challenges in the future.
08:18Those things are extremely important.
08:20But again, President Trump hasn't talked about these in detail.
08:24Neither has his administration.
08:27And given the urgency of dealing with the war in Ukraine,
08:30is it possible right now to think of a longer-term strategy
08:34when it comes to how the U.S. should be dealing with Russia?
08:37What would your advice be, for example, if you were still associated with the National Security Council?
08:43Well, I think we need to have two prongs.
08:46I mean, clearly, we need to be focused on bringing the conflict to an end.
08:52And the administration needs to set up a serious set of negotiations with Moscow,
08:59as well as with our Ukrainian partners and our European allies.
09:04But that doesn't preclude thinking about how we might deal with Russia over the long term.
09:10Russia isn't going to go away.
09:12It's going to continue to be a rival of the United States.
09:15It still has the largest nuclear arsenal in the world.
09:19And so we're going to have to manage very carefully this relationship with Russia into the future.
09:25I think if we begin to think clearly about how we would do that over time,
09:29it also helps us begin to see what we need to accomplish out of a Ukrainian settlement.
09:35What we do in Ukraine, the way this conflict is settled, is going to have consequences for European security.
09:42It's going to have broader consequences for U.S.-Russian relations.
09:45And without some sort of vision of how we're going to manage that relationship going forward,
09:51it makes it more difficult to devise strategies that will both deal with our immediate problems and prepare us for the longer term.
09:59And it's been very difficult to predict how Donald Trump might act on any particular issue.
10:06But do you think that his policies, when it comes to Russia, they might be more considered than they appear at first hand, more thought out?
10:14And what do you make of the suggestion?
10:16We saw it in Yinka's report before we came to you that Vladimir Putin might have some kind of leverage over Donald Trump.
10:24Well, first, I tend to discount the notion that President Putin has some leverage over President Trump.
10:33If he did, it's hard to see how it has really helped Russia advance its own national interest.
10:40It hasn't produced a settlement on Ukraine that is absolutely in Russia's favor.
10:47It hasn't inclined President Trump to lean more heavily on Ukraine.
10:52It hasn't inclined Trump, for example, to walk away from these negotiations.
11:00So I tend to discount that he has any serious leverage over President Trump.
11:07The relationship between the two men is based on, as I already said, a unique, sometimes strange affinity that President Trump appears to have for strongmen, President Putin in particular.
11:22Where this is going to go?
11:24Very difficult to say at this point.
11:27You know, President Trump does want to normalize relations, as I've said.
11:31But I've seen very little from what he has said in public.
11:35I've heard very little from the conversations that I have had with senior officials in Washington as to what that relationship would look like in concrete terms going forward.
11:47Thomas, thanks so much for that insight and that analysis.
11:51Fascinating conversation.
11:52We do appreciate your time on the program.
11:54That is Thomas Graham, Distinguished Fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations.
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