President Trump turned the history of the Western world upside down last week.
As we all learned in high school, the worst example of a weak, naive and dangerous foreign policy occurred in September 1938. That’s when British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain flew to Munich to meet with German Chancellor Adolf Hitler. After which, ignoring Hitler’s build-up of the German army and plans to seize territory from neighboring nations, Chamberlain flew back to England and bragged that he had secured “peace for our time.”
Six months later, Hitler invaded Czechoslovakia and World War II was soon underway. Ever since, historians have talked about the “Lessons of Munich” — that no matter how nicely you treat him and no matter how many promises he makes, you can’t trust a dictator. Only a fool would try. Appeasement doesn’t work.
It seems that everyone learned that lesson — except Donald Trump. From now on, historians won’t be talking about Neville Chamberlain anymore. Instead, history books will focus on the worst example of appeasement in our lifetime: Friday, Feb. 28, when President Trump lured Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky into the Oval Office — and used the occasion to put the United States squarely in the camp of Russian President Vladimir Putin.
Of course, this wasn’t the beginning of Trump’s love affair with Putin, it’s just the latest, crowning episode. It started with developer Donald Trump trying to build a new Trump Tower in Moscow — a project, as former Trump fixer Michael Cohen testified, he pursued even while running for president in 2016. Throughout his first term, Trump praised Putin as a “genius,” “very smart” and a “savvy player on the world stage.”
Most cringe-worthy was Trump’s joint news conference with Putin in Helsinki in July 2018. When asked about reports that Russia had deliberately interfered in the 2016 election, Trump said he trusted Putin over U.S. intelligence agencies. “I have great confidence in my intelligence people, but I will tell you that President Putin was extremely strong and powerful in his denial today,” Trump told reporters. “He just said it’s not Russia. I will say this: I don’t see any reason why it would be.”
At the time, Trump’s faith in Putin was immediately condemned by many Republican members of Congress, including then-Sens. Bob Corker (R-Tenn.) and John McCain (R-Ariz.), who called Trump’s remarks “one of the most disgraceful performances by an American president in history.” You have to wonder what McCain would say today.
But that was just the warm-up to last week’s three-stage, total surrender to Putin. First, Trump attempted to rewrite history and defy reality by calling Zelensky a “dictator” and accusing Ukraine, not Russia, of starting the war in Ukraine. In Trump world, all that video of Russian tanks crossing the border and cruising to Kyiv, all those cities destroyed and some 13,000 civilians killed by Russian troops, is nothing but “fake news.”
Second, at Trump’s direction, the United States voted against a United Nations resolution condemning Moscow for the invasion of Ukraine and supporting Ukraine’s territorial integrity. Breaking with our long-time democratic allies around the globe, the U.S. voted with anti-democratic Russia, Belarus, Sudan, Hungary and North Korea.
The third stage was Trump’s disgraceful ambush of Zelensky in the Oval Office, where Trump not only treated him with disrespect and berated him for not yet winning the war (against a far superior and larger Russian military), but demanded that he accept a ceasefire on Putin’s terms by ceding large swaths of western Ukraine to Russia — thereby giving dictator Putin exactly what he wants.
In effect, Trump told Zelensky: Too bad, chump. For the last three years, we’ve been on your side. But now, we’re on Vladimir Putin’s side. Move over, Neville Chamberlain. Donald Trump just took your place as the “Great Appeaser.”
For the United States, it’s total surrender. And for the Republican Party, it’s a total reversal. Even long-time Putin critics and once-ardent Ukraine supporters like Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) and former senator, now-Secretary of State Marco Rubio have joined Trump in switching sides. From democracy to dictatorship. From Zelensky to Putin.
That loud rumble you hear from California is Ronald Reagan, who famously called Russia the “evil empire,” rolling over in his grave.
Bill Press is host of “The Bill Press Pod.” He is the author of “From the Left: A Life in the Crossfire.” Follow him on BlueSky @BillPress.bsky.social.
