On impressive diplomacy – David E. Sanger in NYT:

‘Mr. Zelensky may yet have to make that choice. But Mr. Trump lifted off from Alaska, ahead of schedule, without having achieved the most basic first step: a temporary cease-fire that would allow further negotiations to take place. It was exactly the outcome, he told reporters earlier on Friday, with which he would not “be happy.”’

(…)

‘But the fact that the two men were not willing to take a single question from reporters — a rarity for the loquacious Mr. Trump, always eager to describe his latest deal, or near-deal — made clear that there was little to talk about, at least for now.’

(...)

‘Most of all, gone was any hint of Mr. Putin’s status as an international pariah, a leader who could not land in most European countries for fear that he might be detained by officials acting on the arrest warrant issued against him for how the war in Ukraine was conducted.
To those who have followed Mr. Trump’s diplomacy, this meeting seemed to have a natural comparison: Mr. Trump’s first encounter seven years ago with Kim Jong-un of North Korea, which was marked by embraces, handshakes, letters testifying to their mutual admiration — and a continued buildup of the North’s nuclear arsenal.’

(…)

‘But in the meantime, Mr. Putin has accomplished a major war goal: He has gotten out of the box of sanctioned autocrat, and was greeted by the president of the United States as a peacemaker. He has bought time. He has defused all that talk of sanctions on his oil sector. And he gave up nothing.
It’s unclear how long any of that will work. But it was impressive diplomacy for less than four hours on American ground.’

Read the article here.

Impressive diplomacy, indeed.

Handshakes and then back to the war, or preparing for the war (North Korea).

Ukraine, merely an afterthought.