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news analysis
President Trump jabs at the Russian leader with threats; Vladimir Putin responds with flattery. But there are notable signals in their jousting, including a revived discussion about nuclear arms control.
By David E. Sanger and Anton Troianovski
David E. Sanger, who has covered five American presidents, reported from Washington. Anton Troianovski, who covers Russia, reported from Berlin.
Jan. 27, 2025, 12:01 a.m. ET
They have been circling each other carefully for seven days now — sending out invitations to talk, mixing a few jabs with ego-stroking, suggesting that the only way to end the Ukraine war is for the two of them to meet, presumably without the Ukrainians.
President Trump and Vladimir V. Putin, whose relationship was always the subject of mystery and psychodrama in the first Trump term, are at it again. But it is not a simple re-run. Mr. Trump was unusually harsh in his rhetoric last week, saying Mr. Putin was “destroying Russia,” and threatening sanctions and tariffs on the country if it doesn’t come to the negotiating table — a fairly empty threat given the tiny amount of trade between the U.S. and Russia these days.
Calculating and understated as ever, Mr. Putin has responded with flattery, agreeing with Mr. Trump that Russia would not have invaded Ukraine had he been president three years ago. He repeated that he was ready to sit down and negotiate over the fate of Europe, superpower to superpower, leader to leader.
So far they have not spoken, though Mr. Trump told reporters on Air Force One on Saturday night that “he wants to speak, and we’ll be speaking soon.” As they prepare the ground for that first conversation, they are sending signals that they want to negotiate about more than just Ukraine — a war that, in Mr. Putin’s telling, is only one of the arenas in which the West is waging its own fight against Russia.
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Both men seem to envision taking on the whole relationship between Moscow and Washington, possibly including revived nuclear arms talks, a conversation that has a looming deadline: The major treaty limiting the arsenals of both nations expires in almost exactly a year. After that, they would be free to pursue the kind of arms race the world has not seen since the deepest days of the Cold War.
