It didn’t take a modern-day Nostradamus to call this one. Vladimir Putin never intended to show up in Istanbul to talk to Volodymyr Zelensky, or anyone else.

Donald Trump made a half-hearted attempt to lure him to a meeting by (sort of) indicating that he “could” also be there. But when Putin announced the names of his second-string team members, Trump immediately backed out as well . . . so quickly, in fact, that one might have thought that was the plan all along.

And, true to his word, Zelensky told Putin to stuff it.

Some sort of meeting is apparently taking place today between Putin’s window-dressing mannequins and an equivalent delegation from Ukraine. But without Putin, Zelensky rightly refused to participate, instead meeting only with Turkish President Erdogan.

And Trump? Well, he summed it up perfectly — in his usual eloquent manner — when he told reporters aboard Air Force One (the American one, not the gifted one from Qatar):

“Nothing’s going to happen until Putin and I get together, okay? And obviously he wasn’t going to go. He was going to go, but he thought I was going to go. He wasn’t going if I wasn’t there. And I don’t believe anything’s going to happen, whether you like it or not, until he and I get together, but we’re going to have to get it solved, because too many people are dying.” [David Brennan, GMA, May 15, 2025.]

And there you have it: the fate of the sovereign nation of Ukraine will be determined, not by its own people or its government, but by two autocrats who — while allegedly holding polar-opposite political views — are in fact orchestrating a scenario that will ultimately benefit them both.

And as Ukraine continues to crumble, the world waits to find out who’s next.

“Sorry, Ukraine.”

Just sayin’ . . .

Brendochka
5/15/25