The Wall Street Journal Rebukes Trump Over ‘Rehabilitation’ of Vladimir Putin: ‘Rewarded’ for ‘Legacy of Destruction’
(AP Photo/Pablo Martinez Monsivais, File)
The Wall Street Journal took President Donald Trump to task in yet another critical editorial on Tuesday night, this time over his “rehabilitation” of Russian dictator Vladimir Putin.
After acknowledging that “global politics can be an ugly business” in its opening paragraph, the Journal nevertheless lamented that “the looming rehabilitation of Vladimir Putin is especially hard to take.”
“Mr. Trump said last week after a phone call with Mr. Putin that he’s convinced the Russian dictator wants “peace.” He didn’t say what kind of peace Mr. Putin has in mind, though if history is a guide it won’t be what most Americans understand by the word,” continued the editorial before enumerating Putin’s crimes, which include starting “the biggest land war in Europe since Hitler,” killing or maiming “hundreds of thousands,” kidnapping Ukrainian children, and torturing and executing enemy combatants.
“We realize that the ruthless men who rule much of the world can’t be ignored. But usually those men aren’t rewarded with a visit to the U.S., as Mr. Trump hinted last week, before they’ve made any compromises,” concluded the Journal. “Visits with Soviet leaders during the Cold War at least had some preparation to assume the U.S. would get something from the diplomacy. Any peace Mr. Putin strikes has to be made with all of his legacy of destruction in mind.”
The center-right newspaper published the editorial shortly after Trump’s shocking comments about the conflict on Tuesday. Speaking to reporters at Mar-a-Lago, the president falsely claimed that Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has a 4% approval rating as well as blamed Zelensky for the outbreak of the war and the horrible consequences for it on the Ukrainian people.
“I think I have the power to end this war, and I think it’s going very well. But today I heard, ‘Well, we weren’t invited.’ Well, you’ve [the Ukrainians] been there for three years,” mused Trump. “You should have ended it three years. You should have never started it. You could have made a deal.”
The Journal had previously warned Trump not to make a “historic mistake” by withdrawing from Europe.
