Putin Tells Diplomats He Made Trump a New Offer on Ukraine at Their Summit

[Mrs. Overall]

Source: Bloomberg

Vladimir Putin told Russian diplomats that he made a proposal to Donald Trump at their summit this week to hold a referendum to help resolve the conflict in eastern Ukraine, but agreed not to disclose the plan publicly so the U.S. president could consider it, according to two people who attended Putin’s closed-door speech on Thursday.

Details of what the two leaders discussed in their summit in Helsinki, Finland, remain scarce, with much of the description so far coming from Russia. While Putin portrayed the Ukraine offer as a sign he’s seeking to bring the four-year-old crisis to an end, a referendum is likely to be a hard sell with Ukraine and its backers in Europe, who remain committed to an 2015 European-brokered truce deal for the Donbas region, parts of which are controlled by Russian-backed separatists.

White House officials didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment. If Putin’s account of Trump’s reaction is accurate, it would suggest a more flexible approach than the U.S. has shown to date on the issue. At the Helsinki meeting, Trump also agreed to consider a Putin request to question the former U.S. ambassador to Moscow over U.S. campaign-finance violations that critics say Trump should have dismissed outright.

Putin gave his latest account of the meeting during at a conference with top Russian ambassadors and officials at the Foreign Ministry in Moscow, the people said, asking not to be identified discussing the president’s comments to the part of the session that was closed to the public. One of the people said that Trump had requested Putin not discuss the referendum idea at the press conference after the summit in order to give the U.S. leader time to mull it.

Read more: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-07-19/putin-said-to-have-made-trump-a-new-offer-on-ukraine-at-summit

[louis c]

1. Trump is a traitor

Benedict Donald

[brooklynite]

24. ...to which country?

[sakabatou]

2. Lemme guess, Donald's gonna hand over Ukraine to Russia?

[Freethinker65]

3. Let's ask Trumpy?

[lapfog_1]

4. We have seen this before...

"When Adolf Hitler came to power he promised to rip up the treaty of Versailles and claim back land that had been taken away from Germany. In 1936 he had marched soldiers into the Rhineland region and reclaimed it for Germany. In March 1938 German troops marched into Austria. The Austrian leader was forced to hold a vote asking the people whether they wanted to be part of Germany. The results of the vote were fixed and showed that 99% of Austrian people wanted Anschluss (union with Germany). The Austrian leader asked Britain, France and Italy for aid. Hitler promised that Anschluss was the end of his expansionist aims and not wanting to risk war, the other countries did nothing."

https://www.historyonthenet.com/nazi-germany-sudetenland/

[Sophia4]

9. Austrians who were in Austria at the time of that vote before the Anschluss told me

that there were numbers written in milk on the backs of their ballots when they voted.

Sounds kind of crazy, but they were convinced that was the case.

Just a historical detail I thought some might find interesting.

Milk?????

[lapfog_1]

18. a cheap invisible ink

allowing the nazi rulers find who voted against them

or at least give the impression to the voters

[sdfernando]

5. Something like:

Donald, Russia is taking over all of Ukraine. You won't do anything about. It would be ashamed if all that Kompromat were to leak out. Now, there's a good boy, have some KFC I brought for you.

[ancianita]

8. Pretty much.

[PSPS]

17. It's much more blunt and mercinary than that

If trump doesn't play along, the flow of russian mob/kremlin money that is the only thing keeping the trump organization afloat will dry up, and that trump tower in moscow will never happen.

[2naSalit]

23. Yup...nt

[busterbrown]

6. Get the Fuck Out of Here!

Putin is suggesting a Summit on the Eastern Ukraine? My Ass.. He knows exactly want from Ukraine and they ain't gonna do anything which will influence Putin's agenda. This summit talk shit.. Is just a way that Putin can deflect all the current negative attention being thrown at Trump...

[ancianita]

7. Putin say, " New Rule: No govt. peeps when we meet. After, ONLY I SPEAK on what we said."

Pootie say, "Okay, Boss."

[Sophia4]

11. Trump may not remember clearly what was said.

I'm beginning to wonder about his memory. Memories begin to be unreliable for some people as we age.

[sandensea]

12. And in Cheeto's case, to paraphrase Upton Sinclair, it's hard to expect him to remember anything,

when his paycheck depends on his not remembering a damn thing.

[ancianita]

13. Thus, I'm free to write the translator's narrative. Don't ever underestimate Trump's situation with

Putin.

[SummerSnow]

10. Putin: "I'm going to take over this region and you wont do a damn thing about it"

Trump: "Okay boss"

[ancianita]

14. Putin: "American translator, write anything down on pain of death. Translator: "Okay, Mr. Putin."

Putin: "Now, take a knee, suck it and swallow."

Pootie: "Nom nom, Boss."

[Progressive dog]

15. So Trump has to think about

whether we manipulate Ukraine to give up part of its territory to a dictator and the Republicans will soon explain to us why it's a clever move.

[Trumpdumper]

16. Bizarre and scary

Before this leaked, Putin was willing to let Trump mull over whatever it is that he proposed. You know that Trump is too stupid, too incurious, and too fixated on reacting to whatever is going on in the news to have given the proposal a second, or even a first, thought. If this hadn't leaked, Trump would've forgotten about it, as we know that he never completes -- or even starts -- his homework. I'm certain that this is the first that Bolton or Pompeo or Mattis has heard of the plan.

[TeamPooka]

19. Putin wants an election he can rig and Trump will let him do it.

[2naSalit]

25. Exactly...nt

[thucythucy]

20. How about we give the residents of South Sakhalin the chance to vote

on rejoining Japan?

Or the residents of Kaliningrad (used to be Konigsberg) the chance to rejoin Germany?

[hamsterjill]

21. This is another reason whereby any "sane" and legitimate President would want people in the room.

Putin can say anything he likes and there's no one to repudiate it because Trump and the interpreter were the only ones in the room.

Trump was played like a fiddle.

[2naSalit]

26. He wasn't played...

he is obeying orders.

[hamsterjill]

27. True.

But I think Vlad does something every once in a while to show Donnie that he (Vlad) is still more of a "stable genius".

Either way, I hope the orange bastard is carried off in chains.

[blueinredohio]

22. When is Trump going to hand over the U.S.?

[murielm99]

28. He did that already.