Anna Hartz
Many people believe international politics runs on logic, strategy or diplomacy. But sometimes it comes down to personalities, worldviews and the rules people carry from their past.
When those rules collide, even powerful leaders can talk past one another. This seems to be the case in the long and confusing effort to end the war in Ukraine, where two very different men keep failing to understand each other.
The Code That Putin Follows
Donald Trump has tried several approaches in his push for peace in Ukraine. He welcomed Vladimir Putin to Alaska. He backed Ukrainian strikes on Russian oil refineries. He floated ideas about letting Russia keep territory it has not been able to conquer. None of this has produced results. This has raised a simple question in the United States: why does nothing work?
Writers at The Atlantic argue that Trump misunderstands the code Putin follows. It is a code the Russian leader absorbed during his youth in Leningrad, writes Ziare. Trump sees international politics as a deal. Putin sees a deal as a sign that the other side is weak. The two approaches do not meet in the middle.
Putin grew up in a rough environment shaped by the unwritten rules known as ponyatiya. These rules came out of Soviet prisons and shaped whole neighborhoods. You protected your group. You answered every insult. You respected strength and dismissed weakness. Putin still lives by this logic. Many of his old friends from the 1980s now run large businesses, and he stands by them no matter what they do.
Different Strategies
This mindset also influences his foreign policy. Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky should, in Putin’s view, be weaker. Yet Ukraine keeps resisting Russia. That creates frustration for the Kremlin. At the same time, Trump often presents himself to Putin as someone eager to please. He praises Putin. He calls him smart and strong. He keeps offering deals.
In Putin’s world, the one who makes the first offer loses ground. So every time Trump reaches out, he lowers his own position. Even when Trump takes tougher steps, such as sanctions on Russian oil companies or pressure on India and China, Putin reads the bigger picture through his old code.
If peace talks fail again, Trump may respond with new sanctions or he may return with yet another proposal. For now, the problem remains the same. One man thinks he is entering a negotiation room. The other thinks he is defending his place in a courtyard ruled by old laws. Until Trump understands that world, progress will stay out of reach.
Sources: Ziare, The Atlantic
