Trump and Putin Meet
Trump and Putin Meet
China continues to bully the Philippines on the sea. This morning’s feature story, from Jeremiah Jacques, details an extraordinary incident on Monday when a Chinese naval destroyer harassed a small Philippine Coast Guard ship in Philippine waters. In this case, the vessel inadvertently rammed another Chinese ship. But it still shows China’s growing belligerence.
The big Trump-Putin summit is this afternoon: The stakes are high as Russia’s president meets face-to-face with a U.S. president for the first time since before he invaded Ukraine, and comes onto U.S. soil for the first time in a decade.
Will the summit end the Ukraine war? (Don’t count on it.) Will Putin use his KGB-trained charms to flatter and wiles to dupe Trump? (One, you bet; two, to some degree, probably.) Will Trump realize that Putin’s peace talks are just feints and games? (One hopes.)
President Trump wants so badly to deliver on his campaign promise to end the Ukraine war. He wants his Nobel. He has already reneged on his threat to impose tough sanctions on Russia last week, instead offering Putin an invitation to Alaska. Many European leaders are concerned Trump will succumb to Putin’s flattery and accept his tactics of making notional concessions to drag out negotiations while continuing to intensify the war.
On the other hand, Putin may have reasons for ending the war. While his long-term goals will remain unchanged, he may view some kind of drawdown in Ukraine as serving those interests. And President Trump’s efforts to end other conflicts, while at times plagued by naivety, have showcased his unique clout and dealmaking ability. We will see what he pulls out of his hat for this afternoon’s meeting.
Meanwhile, Germany may want the war to continue: Norbert Röttgen, foreign-policy spokesman of the Christian Democrat Union’s Bundestag group, may have said the quiet part out loud in an interview with FAZ:
By fighting, Ukraine is buying time for Europeans to become capable of defending themselves. Because we are not there yet.
This could explain a lot about Germany’s approach to Ukraine. Germans have repeatedly promised significant support to Ukraine, only to under-deliver. Still, they have given more than the bare minimum. Gerald Flurry has long believed Germany has made a deal with Russia similar to the one that preceded World War II. But Röttgen’s statement seems to illuminate the overall strategy: Preserve the deal with Russia, but slow it down. Though Germany and Russia are willing to make a deal, they don’t trust each other and expect the deal to fall apart at some point. So Germany wants to slow Russia down as it prepares for the next world war.
At the same time, the longer this war continues, the stronger Russia is getting. It is proving to be like a massive war game to improve weapons and military strategy. As Mr. Flurry explained about Germany and Russia:
These two nations are working to empower themselves and each other at the expense of Europe and the U.S.-led world order. Both want to tear down that order and build themselves into great empires! Those empires will inevitably clash, but for now it is in both Germany’s and Russia’s interest to weaken everyone else and strengthen themselves and each other. With this in mind, Germany’s duplicitous behavior is easy to understand.
On VJ Day, a sober reminder: Sfgate.com published an article about the celebrations that took place in San Francisco when Japan’s surrender was announced and World War II ended, 80 years ago today. Sadly, those celebrations devolved into “a three-night orgy of vandalism, looting, assault, robbery, rape and murder”—wreaked almost entirely by young Navy enlistees who had not served in the war.
It is a lamentable picture of people unchastened by an unprecedented war that snuffed out 405,000 Americans and 70 to 85 million lives worldwide.
By the time the “Peace Riots” burned themselves out on Friday morning, 13 people were dead, at least six women had been raped, 1,059 people were injured, and an incalculable amount of damage had been done to businesses, public buildings, streetcars, cars, traffic lights, signs, barber poles, marquees and everything else the rioters had gotten their hands on. They were the deadliest riots in the city’s history.
Just as appalling, nobody was held accountable for their crimes. Officials simply looked the other way and pretended it never happened.
No sailor or civilian was ever charged with murder, rape, looting, assault or any serious crime. Although six women were treated for rape at Central Emergency Hospital, police never filed a report of a single rape case. No officials, civilian or military, were ever punished or even reprimanded.
Human nature is notoriously unteachable. God tries to straighten out errant behavior through warnings. When those don’t work, He brings curses like war to humble us and correct us. But foolish men don’t even heed those. As Proverbs 17:10 says, “A reproof entereth more into a wise man than an hundred stripes into a fool.” That is, sadly, what makes the unparalleled suffering of the coming prophesied “great tribulation” necessary.
IN OTHER NEWS
Israel vs. Germany over settlements: Pushing back against several nations declaring their intent to recognize a Palestinian state, Israel’s finance minister announced plans to build thousands of new housing units in West Bank settlements earlier this week. Yesterday, Germany called the plan illegal and a threat to the two-state solution, specifically a project that would divide Palestinian territory. The Netanyahu government’s bold decision-making as of late is forcing several nations to reveal their deep-seated hostility toward the Jewish state.
North Korea will soon send 6,000 more troops to Russia to fight in the Ukraine war, Ukraine’s military intelligence chief said Wednesday. It will also send battle tanks and armored personnel carriers. The plans say the soldiers will mainly help Russia demine and rebuild parts of Russia’s Kursk region, which Ukrainian forces captured last year. But these soldiers could end up assisting Russia in other areas, including on the front lines, as some previous deployments of North Korean soldiers have. The new deployment will bring the number of North Korean troops helping Russia to around 20,000—a significant number of soldiers. These developments show that the groundwork is being laid for North Korea to take its place in the prophesied Putin-led 200 million-man army, the details of which are laid out in The Prophesied ‘Prince of Russia.’
Birmingham’s local council is urgently saving its residents from a deadly danger: Residents have been flying Union Jacks and the Cross of St. George on the city’s streams in a resurgence of patriotism. The council issued a statement warning that these put the lives of pedestrians and motorists “at risk.” The council declared itself bankrupt in 2023 and is struggling to do basic tasks like collect rubbish. Palestinian flags are commonly flown in the city, but these, apparently, pose no danger. The city is almost one third Muslim; the majority are not white British. Behold the result: a city with a foreign mayor preventing the national flag being flown on the streets. It has become a foreign city. The Bible prophesied that mass migration would become a curse. “The stranger that is within thee shall get up above thee very high; and thou shalt come down very low,” Deuteronomy 28:43 warns. That is exactly what has happened in Britain.
