So, New York has a new mayor – Zohran Mamdani. That wouldn’t normally be a big deal, if it weren’t for the sharp reaction from President Donald Trump and his allies. It’s clear that one of America’s most important cities has chosen to back its own candidate – whether he’s a socialist or not, Muslim or not, isn’t the issue. The point is, New York has made it clear it doesn’t want Trump. And that’s a worrying sign for the president.Well, I don't know how much of a general signal Momdani’s election in New York really is, for two reasons. We should always keep in mind that Donald Trump is extremely unpopular in New York. Even though he was born and raised there, he left New York and has now moved to Florida.In any case, I think this election doesn’t necessarily say much about Trump’s electoral future or his political strength. First, New York City is one of the most liberal, left-of-center constituencies in the United States. Therefore, it was to be expected that Momdani would win.He was far ahead in the polls, although the former governor of New York, Andrew Cuomo, had begun to close the gap to about six percentage points. But this is a place where a very far-left candidate is likely to win.We should also keep in mind that Donald Trump was not on the ballot. As we saw in other recent elections in the states of New Jersey and Virginia, Republicans did not perform well. In fact, Republicans have generally struggled in recent years when Trump himself is not on the ballot, such as during off-year or midterm elections when there is no presidential race.Trump’s public approval rating is currently the lowest it has ever been, around 36 or 37 percent, so his popularity is clearly declining. Still, I don’t think the New York mayoral election necessarily reflects that trend. President Trump met with Xi Jinping. There were plenty of formalities, but the real substance wasn’t in the official statements. Did the two leaders actually reach any meaningful agreements?Was Trump able to sway Xi on anything? Because after their meeting, the Chinese leader made no remarks whatsoever about Russia’s aggression – and that silence speaks volumes.We know from President Trump’s statements after his meeting with Xi Jinping that they discussed Ukraine. President Trump said they talked about Ukraine for quite some time.He also said they were looking for ways to end the war and to persuade Putin to stop it. However, President Trump did not give any details, and neither did Xi Jinping. So we don’t know exactly what they discussed regarding Ukraine.But we do know from the past, a couple of years ago, when Xi Jinping and China presented their so-called peace plan for Ukraine, that the main point was supporting Ukraine’s territorial integrity. This is something Vladimir Putin strongly disliked, but it is important for China because of its position on Taiwan.In recent years, there have been reports from many sources that Xi Jinping, on the one hand, does not want the war to end because he fears that if it does, the United States and Donald Trump will turn their attention to China and Taiwan. At the same time, reports have indicated that Xi Jinping pressured President Putin to stop threatening to use nuclear weapons, reportedly saying that such threats were too escalatory.So I would guess the conversation was along the lines I just outlined. We should also keep in mind that while China and Russia have declared a strategic partnership with no limits, there are tensions between the two countries. Russia, I think, does not like being treated as the junior partner in that relationship, but it is. They also have growing tensions in Central Asia, as well as disputes over minerals and trade in general. In addition, they had border disputes in eastern Siberia for many decades. China is consolidating its power – something we haven’t seen in decades.Beijing has managed to make Washington take its demands on global trade and influence seriously. It’s far from the end of the story, but China is clearly showing it’s ready to assert itself. When it comes to the war between Russia and Ukraine and the prospect of peace talks, the Budapest meeting collapsed.The U.S. administration has finally realized that while Putin is willing to talk, he’s offering nothing of substance. He also seems to completely misinterpret what Donald Trump means, creating a kind of cognitive dissonance. We see Putin’s determination to keep the war going – but there’s still no sign of any Tomahawk missiles.Right, yes, I very much agree.President Trump has come to understand that President Putin, as Trump puts it, says nice things to him but never takes the actions that Trump asks for in terms of ending his war on Ukraine.President Trump has publicly expressed his frustration, saying he feels that Putin just “taps him along,” which is a colloquial American expression meaning flattering without sincerity and without any intention of taking real action. Still, President Trump is negotiating with a certain level of skill.The Tomahawks, I think, were part of a negotiating threat to Putin – to show him that as Ukraine strikes oil facilities, refineries, and other targets deep inside Russian territory, things could get worse. The United States could provide those Tomahawk missiles. In addition, Germany is now going to provide more Patriot air defense missiles, with the United States replenishing those supplies with new Patriots.This means more air defense support for Ukraine, which President Trump is tacitly agreeing to, even though the United States is not directly paying for it. These are signals to President Putin. The same goes for President Trump’s recent phone call with President Zelensky, which at first sounded more positive, even though the two leaders reportedly ended up yelling at each other.I think President Trump’s focus, let me put it this way. He doesn’t really care about Ukraine or Russia. He doesn’t care about democracy in the United States. He simply wants the war to end so that he can claim to have negotiated a deal and hopes to receive the Nobel Peace Prize. In this sense, he stands in sharp contrast to previous American presidents who firmly believed that US national security is tied to Ukraine’s survival, prosperity, and safety.I think Trump is very impatient with Putin. Once in a while, he also gets impatient with Zelensky, especially when he is frustrated that the war isn’t ending. But I think he finally realizes that it’s not Zelensky who caused the war – it’s Putin, and Putin is the one who needs to stop it. If we look at the negotiation framework, it’s clear the two sides are still very far apart. Russia wants to seize more Ukrainian territory, gain international recognition for it, and influence Ukraine’s internal politics. These are the kinds of ambitions we used to read about in history or political science textbooks, but today they would amount to a geopolitical shock. Still, it’s important to explore possible directions for talks. Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has once again offered to host negotiations. Do you think any kind of formula could actually be put on paper? When two sides hold completely opposing positions, no one will sign anything because the political backlash would be enormous.I fully agree with you that the goals of Ukraine and Russia are completely incompatible. Putin wants exactly what you said.He wants regime change. He wants to disarm Ukraine completely so that it can never defend itself. He also includes among the supposed root causes of his decision to invade Ukraine the enlargement of NATO, and he wants NATO to withdraw its military and perhaps even political presence from the so-called new NATO member states in Eastern Europe, which will not happen.I think Putin simply wants to keep fighting until Ukraine is exhausted, relying on Russia’s much larger population, which he has been willing to sacrifice for his war aims.As for what could be put on paper, President Trump, when he last met Putin in Alaska and later spoke with President Zelensky, reportedly discussed the idea of freezing the war along the current front lines and then negotiating the future status of the territories occupied by Russia at some later point. This would mean Donetsk, Luhansk, and the Donbas region in general, as well as Crimea. And then Trump seems to have succeeded in persuading Putin to drop demands that Zaporizhia and Kherson be recognized as part of the Russian Federation. Trump viewed that as a step forward.So I guess what could be put on paper is, as I said, freezing the military lines where they are now and stopping the fighting. Russia would no longer claim Zaporizhia or Kherson. The status of the other occupied territories would be negotiated later.But Putin does not want that. He wants to keep fighting to exhaust Ukraine and force its surrender so Russia can achieve its maximal goals, which I do not believe will ever happen. The war is in a strategic stalemate. The machinery of war is stuck in a rut, turning in place and costing lives. To change the situation in our favor, we need heavy offensive weapons. Ukrainian fighters have shown how effectively they can strike Russian oil refineries. The Russians did not expect it. Russia’s vast territory, once an advantage, has become a major weakness because they lack enough air defense systems to protect all their strategic sites.Of course the Russians are worried. We still need more weapons, and we need them in sufficient numbers. We all remember the circus when the Biden administration sent a couple dozen Abrams tanks. That helped, but it was not enough for a decisive breakthrough. Now we need powerful offensive capabilities. Do you think we will get them, or will the cycle continue with us destroying Russian strategic and military targets while they keep striking our cities?First of all, we should recognize how remarkably innovative Ukraine has become in drone warfare and in military tactics overall, especially in drone production. At the beginning of the war, Ukraine relied heavily on drones produced in Turkey, and we all remember the popular song about the Bayraktar.Those drones, however, are too large and too expensive. Now Ukraine is producing small, inexpensive, high-performance drones that have completely changed the nature of warfare. Of course, tanks and other advanced weapons are still needed, but they will not be coming from President Trump’s administration unless the Europeans purchase them and then send them to Ukraine – that is the plan.We also see that Ukraine is increasingly producing its own artillery and weapons across the board. Ukraine has taken much greater responsibility for its own military production.As for Tomahawks, who knows if President Trump will actually provide them? As I mentioned earlier, I think he was using the threat of the United States supplying Tomahawk cruise missiles to Ukraine as a way to pressure President Putin. After Putin called Trump, Trump said, “Okay, we’re not going to provide those Tomahawks.” Trump may decide to provide them in the future. No one can predict with any accuracy when or how he might change his mind.I think Ukraine is doing a great job right now in targeting Russia’s oil refineries. Most estimates I’ve seen suggest that the supply of Russian refined products such as diesel and gasoline has decreased by about 20 percent. Fuel prices are at the highest level in Russian history, so Ukraine is clearly having an impact.In the end, what will force Putin to stop his war is when Russia runs out of money. The sanctions President Trump has applied to Lukoil and Rosneft mark a dramatic shift in the US approach, which previously aimed to keep Russian crude oil flowing to global markets to prevent prices from rising too high and affecting US elections. The earlier policy required that Russian oil be purchased below the target price, originally set at 60 dollars per barrel.Now President Trump has adopted a completely different policy, one that reduces the flow of Russian oil into global markets and hurts the Russian economy by cutting off vital oil revenues. This will weaken Russia’s economy, especially as it burns through its reserve funds. Even though Russia has restructured its economy to support the war effort, at some point it will simply run out of money to sustain it.We should also remember that military production is perhaps the least economically efficient form of investment. Weapons are built only to be destroyed on the battlefield, and they provide no lasting multiplier effect for the economy.I think it is economics that will ultimately compel Putin to end the war. But he wants to fight as long as possible, hoping Ukraine will be exhausted first and that European countries will stop supporting Ukraine before he runs out of money. Russian losses have been massive thanks to the remarkable effectiveness of Ukrainian forces, and they are likely to grow even further given what may be ahead – a possible major conflict in Venezuela. Donald Trump appears ready to take on the Venezuelan drug cartels. About thirty years ago, there was a similar story when the United States dealt with Panamanian dictator General Noriega through a powerful military operation that ended with Noriega in prison. Now it seems Trump is preparing for a short, victorious war. It might remain a limited police-style operation, or it could become something bigger.While much of the world is focused on wars, equally important developments are unfolding in the oil and gas fields. The shale revolution has already taken place, with the United States entering the shale gas market. At the same time, major shifts are reshaping the global oil market. How could the Venezuelan scenario affect the broader energy landscape, and what losses might Russia face as a result?Nobody really knows what President Trump’s intentions are toward Venezuela.At the beginning of his administration, one of his advisers, Rick Grenell, the former ambassador to Germany, visited Nicolás Maduro in Venezuela and brought back prisoners or hostages who had been held there. But later, President Trump changed his policy and became very hostile toward both Venezuela and Maduro.When he began targeting Venezuelan speedboats that were supposedly bringing drugs, especially fentanyl, into the United States, he focused on the Caribbean Sea, even though very little fentanyl enters the US that way. Most of it comes through the Pacific route, particularly from Colombia. So from the start, it looked as if the targeting of Venezuelan speedboats was just a pretext or an excuse for something else.Clearly, Trump seems to want Maduro out of office. But whether he is using this military buildup to intimidate Maduro or provoke some kind of uprising against him, or whether he is actually planning to invade Venezuela, as the United States once did to remove Manuel Noriega, the military dictator of Panama, remains to be seen. I don’t know if Trump has made up his mind yet, but when it comes to oil markets, Venezuelan, Russian, and even Iranian production being removed from the global marketplace is unlikely to have much impact on global oil prices. There is currently an oversupply in the market. Inventories have been building across the world, and the International Energy Agency predicts that there will be excess supply over demand by 2026 as OPEC Plus continues producing at higher levels.OPEC Plus has been increasing production, and some of its members, such as Kazakhstan and the United Arab Emirates, have historically exceeded their agreed production limits, delivering more oil to the market than allowed. So even without Russian, Venezuelan, or Iranian oil, we are unlikely to see a major spike in prices. However, if oil from those countries does not reach the market, their economies will suffer significantly. When we talk about Russia’s capabilities, do they really grasp how serious their financial losses could become? On the battlefield, they seem overly confident in their ability to mobilize, convinced they have enough soldiers to keep fighting for another year or two, maybe even three. Meanwhile, Elvira Nabiullina is likely assuring Putin that the Russian economy can sustain a long, aggressive war against Ukraine. Russians have always been militaristic optimists. But we’ve seen before how an arms race can end – with the collapse of the Soviet Union.What matters now is not that Russia’s losses will eventually hurt, but whether Putin already feels the danger. Looking at how he manages both the economy and the war, do you think he senses the personal risk these economic losses pose to him and his regime?American shale gas is turned into liquefied natural gas and exported around the world, with much of it going to Europe. That supply is completely unaffected by anything Trump might do in Venezuela, even if he ends up invading the country and toppling Maduro’s regime.As for Russia, as we discussed earlier, Putin has restructured the Russian economy to operate as a wartime economy. Beyond exporting oil and gas, Russian industry is now overwhelmingly focused on military production.The banking system in Russia is facing serious difficulties because it has been forced to issue loans at below-market rates to defense companies that need this kind of support to stay in operation. This has created significant weakness in the financial sector.If Putin were to suddenly stop the war, all the companies and factories that have retooled for military production would have nothing to do, which would trigger a massive economic crisis. So I don’t think Putin is winning in any economic sense. As I mentioned, this war will likely end when Putin no longer has the financial resources to keep it going.But you're right that Russia has a long tradition of military optimism. It has relied on its vast size to exhaust both Napoleon and Adolf Hitler. Putin is following the same pattern, willing to sacrifice hundreds of thousands, even millions, of soldiers to try to wear down Ukraine. He will continue doing that as long as he can. So no, he is not winning.As we know, over the past year, Russia’s territorial gains inside Ukraine have been minimal, less than 1%, achieved at the cost of 350 to 400 thousand soldiers. By any measure, Putin is losing. He has already lost the war if we look at his original objectives.But he still hopes to exhaust Ukraine and its supporters in Europe and the United States, counting on the possibility that Russia can simply hold out until that exhaustion sets in. Marco Rubio’s clash with Lavrov – is it serious enough to influence Donald Trump’s position and his “peace through strength” strategy? Or is it something they can patch up quickly?I think Lavrov’s public statements really angered not only Senator Rubio but also President Trump.It was after those statements, I believe, that Trump imposed sanctions on Lukoil and Rosneft. I would guess that both Rubio and Trump were offended because Lavrov seemed to reject the US proposals for a ceasefire and even sounded somewhat threatening toward the United States. That approach never works with Donald Trump.But foreign ministers often get angry with one another. I have worked directly with Minister Lavrov – he is an absolute professional. I believe both foreign ministers will eventually move past these recent tensions and hopefully get back to work on pursuing a ceasefire in Ukraine, though I am not optimistic that this will happen soon.