‘The Telegraph’: “Trump & Putin Inc.” is a perfectly harmonious joint venture

Photo: Eurasia Review

Trump’s plan to force Ukraine to restore Putin’s gas empire. All evidence so far is that Trump & Putin Inc is a perfectly harmonious joint venture, stresses ‘The Telegraph’.

Donald Trump is holding a gun to the head of Volodymyr Zelensky, demanding huge reparations payments and laying claim to half of Ukraine’s oil, gas, and hydrocarbon resources as well as almost all its metals and much of its infrastructure.

The latest version of his “minerals deal”, obtained by The Telegraph, is unprecedented in the history of modern diplomacy and state relations.

“It is an expropriation document,” said Alan Riley, an expert on energy law at the Atlantic Council. “There are no guarantees, no defence clauses, the US puts up nothing. The Americans can walk away, the Ukrainians can’t. I’ve never seen anything like it before.”

The text leaves little doubt that Mr Trump’s chief objective is to incorporate Ukraine as a province of America’s oil, gas and resource industries.

It dovetails with parallel talks between the US and Russia for a comprehensive energy partnership, including plans to restore West Siberian gas flows to Europe in large volumes, with US companies and Trump-aligned financiers gaining a major stake in the business.

The revived gas trade would flow through Ukraine’s network, and later via the Baltic as the sabotaged Nord Stream pipelines are brought back on stream.

The Trump White House says Putin would not dare to attack if America has commercial skin in the game, but this has no currency in a context where it is also negotiating sweetheart energy deals with Kirill Dmitriev, the head of Russia’s sovereign wealth fund.

Germany’s Bild Zeitung said talks have been underway for weeks in Switzerland to reopen the Nord Stream 2 pipelines, conducted secretly by ex-Stasi agent Matthias Warnig and Trump’s envoy Richard Grenell, a man known for his Kremlin sympathies.

The terms would give US contractors operational control and a fat revenue stream, creating money out of “thin air”. A cynic might call it a legal “donation” to Mr Trump’s circle by the Kremlin.

Mr Trump has agreed to help Russia restore its “access to the world market for agricultural and fertiliser exports, lower maritime insurance costs, and enhance access to ports and payment systems for such transactions” as reward for the non-concession of a Black Sea maritime truce, which also helps Russia more than Ukraine.

Putin specifically wants Russia’s farm bank, Rosselkhozbank, restored to the Swift payments system, and he wants the embargo lifted on farm equipment, which has dual-use capability for his war machine. He is well on his way to securing both.

Europe’s sanctions regime is near to disintegration as well. Hungary and Slovakia have both said they will not vote for a roll over of existing curbs, which means that sanctions will automatically expire in July, and so will control over €200bn (£170bn) of Russian central bank holdings in Europe.

“If even one EU member state votes against the asset freeze, the freeze will lapse. The Central Bank of Russia can then immediately withdraw its deposit from Euroclear,” said the Royal United Services Institute.

“For all the talk of reparations and accountability, the EU would find itself handing over €200bn to the regime that launched Europe’s biggest war since World War Two – an Afghanistan-style moment for EU foreign policy.”

That is where we are heading with Europe’s “carefully calibrated dithering”. Europe and Britain will end up having to foot the entire bill for rebuilding what remains of Ukraine at the end of this betrayal, while Mr Trump scoops up Ukraine’s chief means of economic recovery, and Putin gets his €200bn back.

Jim Ratcliffe, CIA director, told the Senate committee this week that Mr Trump knows it would be dangerous if Putin achieved his “maximalist” objectives.

Trump’s plan to force Ukraine to restore Putin’s gas empire.

All evidence so far is that Trump & Putin Inc is a perfectly harmonious joint venture.

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